


Dipolemacy

by raisedbymoogles



Category: Transformers Generation One
Genre: Art, Culture, Gen, Ghosts, History, Pole Dancing, Politics, Undercover Operations, culture clash, post-war Cybertron
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-20
Updated: 2015-10-29
Packaged: 2018-03-08 10:25:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 35,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3205841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raisedbymoogles/pseuds/raisedbymoogles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Alternate title: Cybertron’s Got Talent.)</p><p>With Cybertron recovering from its long and destructive war, Rodimus Prime journeys to the Seeker-controlled city of New Vos in order to reclaim a part of himself long forgotten. But a dark secret and a fight over New Vos's future threatens to destroy everything Rodimus has worked so hard to build, and will push his skills both old and new to the limit. Politics is a dance, and in New Vos, dance can be deadly.</p><p>…it’s a political drama about giant poledancing robots, y'all. I - really can't even. XD</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It didn't take long for the newly-minted Rodimus Prime to develop the instincts common to most officers, aided by having so recently being only a lowest-rank soldier and knowing how they thought and felt. He could tell in a sparkpulse when one of his Autobots was fatigued, physically or mentally; he could sense brewing interpersonal conflicts and deftly defuse them without even seeming to notice anything was amiss at all. He could read the faces of any team and know how to gain their confidence.

He could also, from repeated experience, tell when his beloved comrades were up to something. The hastily-turned-off display screen and the scrambling to Look Busy, admittedly, were major hints; subtle his friends weren't. Hands on his hips, Rodimus delivered an arch look at the room; none of them met his optics. "All quiet?" he asked dryly.

"Nothing to report, Prime," Blaster answered professionally, which was a screaming alarm klaxon if Rodimus ever heard one. He moved forward, aware of Arcee, Blurr, Pipes, and Blaster watching him, to stand by Blaster's side at the comm station with its newly-installed wide screen.

"Well, I need to check the shuttle schedules," he announced, and reached out to turn the screen on. He was far, far too wickedly gratified when the room erupted in a chorus of _"No!"_

Rodimus hit the power switch, and the room froze.

The small mech on the screen resembled a lick of fire, all flashing reds and yellows as he danced on the shining silver pole. With encouragement from the unseen mech making the recording, he swung back and powerfully forwards, only to turn and hook his legs around the pole to spin upside down, all to the beat of a bright, energetic Iaconian orchestral arrangement. “Great job, lad,” said the unseen recorder, and the dancer turned to give the camera a cheeky, all-too-familiar grin.

 _"Arcee,"_ Rodimus growled.

"It wasn't me!" Arcee protested. "I didn't even know you used to be a dancer!"

"It was me, Prime," Pipes volunteered, stepping up to take his lumps. "I was going through some archives with Grapple, and, well..."

 _"Grapple,"_ Rodimus groaned.

"ButIdon'tunderstandwhatyouhavetobeashamedaboutRoddyImeanreally," Blurr burst in. "You'rereallygoodwehadnoidea!"

Rodimus sighed slowly, turned the display off again before he could see his former self execute another perfect, graceful spin. "I'm not really good," he answered, and the heaviness in his voice settled over the room. _"Hot Rod_ was really good." He moved to the door, avoiding their optics as they had avoided his. "As you were."

He couldn't hurry down the hall fast enough to avoid hearing again the strains of the music he'd danced to, long ago.

***

When he really looked at it, Rodimus almost couldn't believe this was his Iacon anymore.

Hot Rod had been built after the Ark launch, when all of Cybertron was dark and quiet. The war happened in flashes, energon raids and sabotage brief flares of activity in a long, cold night. Optimus Prime and Megatron, Jazz and Starscream and Prowl were all stories the older ones told to a wide-opticked kid so new he still smelled like fresh paint, in between missions and to pass the time on migrations underground. The Iacon warrens had been his playground and proving ground, and he'd known it like he knew his own specs. Aboveground was a rare treat, even - perhaps _because_ \- when it meant battle.

No battles took place in Iacon anymore, and all its business happened aboveground. Here and there were patches of darkness, but for the most part Iacon was well-lit and bustling with activity: commerce, art, construction. It was more like a human city than any Cybertronian city Rodimus was used to.

In that it was actually, y'know, mostly functional.

Despite the advice of most - well, all - of his elder advisors, Rodimus walked the streets of Iacon without entourage, without so much as a bodyguard. It was past the end of the day shift, and the street he walked was all but deserted. Most people had either gone home or to join Iacon's growing nightlife, another concept they'd borrowed from human cities. Older, battle-scarred buildings shared space with shiny new edifices, both painted over in celebratory glyphs for the end of the war and the Autobot victory. Here and there the citizens of Iacon noted their Prime walking among them, but they'd all learned quickly that Rodimus was embarrassed by overt displays of devotion and so he was spared anything more than the occasional shout of greeting or offer to try some new confection at his favorite goodie maker's stall.

Fingers still sticky from the treat, Rodimus found the brief burst of energy giving him new courage - or recklessness, maybe, he'd never been too clear on the difference. And there just happened to be a streetlight to hand, and the pole looked about right...

It was too big around for a classic dancer's pole, but Rodimus's hands were bigger too. He grasped it above his head and leaned out, letting his own weight swing him around. Once, twice, the music thumping in his head; he hummed along with it, and hooked an ankle backwards around the pole. His spark quickened within him; Primus, he remembered the moves so easily, like all the wonder and terror in between then and now had never happened at all. He extended his free arm over his head, trailing it gracefully like a gauze veil, then reached up to grasp the pole and haul himself up on it, wrapping his thighs around its girth. Another spin, legs kicking out straight; this was always the hardest part for him, making the climb look effortless and graceful. He'd always tended to scramble up the pole, in a hurry to get to the next pose, but he liked to think he was a little more mature now. Climb, turn, let it spin him around slowly as he reaches up to climb again, feel the pole creak and sway - "Oh, mother of slag!"

The pole was bending, and too late Rodimus realized his mistake. He descended with the pole, cursing all the way, as the light overhead cut out with a _snap_ of breaking wire. He was clinging to the pole with both hands and knees like a rank amateur, no longer the being of gossamer-lightness on the screen back in the comm room at Autobot HQ, and the knowledge that he would _never be that again_ tore at his spark as his spoiler touched ground.

_The difference between courage and recklessness: it's only courage if it works._

He let go. The streetlight sprang back, but not all the way, its metal twisted into a permanent arc, and the light was still off. Someone would have to repair that. Rodimus sprawled out with another curse at his own stupidity and lay there, staring up at the sky, simmering in resentment for the unfairness of all. "Slagging pitspawn Matrix," he muttered. _"Aaaaagh!"_ He punched at the sky.

Someone giggled behind him. Rodimus froze, the chilling thought that _someone heard me curse the Matrix_ crossing his processor before the thought of the failed dance or the bent streetlight. Bracing himself for horror or reproach, he tilted his head back and saw - after he flipped the image right-side-up in his optics - a single small blue Neutral, hand pressed to his mouth, slim shoulders shaking as he giggled. The sleek lines of him made Rodimus think 'flier model' for a moment, but the lack of prominent wings made him revise that to 'aquatic model.'

"I'm sorry!" the Neutral babbled through his giggles, flapping his free hand at him. "I'm sorry, just - I saw you dance, and - are you all right?"

"Yeah," Rodimus croaked, too relieved about not getting in trouble for committing sacrilege to worry much about the laughter. It wasn't mean or mocking, like his fellow soldiers could sometimes be - they all had their hard edges, even Roddy - and when he thought about it, yeah, it had been pretty funny. "Yeah," he said again, "I'm fine. Just, uh, my dignity may need some repair." He hopped to his feet, stumbled a bit before he remembered to fix his optics so he was seeing right-side-up again. "Sorry, I don't think we've been introduced...?" He hoped not, he was usually pretty good with faces unless he had other things on his mind.

The Neutral smiled warmly, golden optics bright. "I'm Polaris. And you're," he added, "Rodimus Prime. It's an honor."

Something about the way he said it - like it was something he said all the time, and meeting the Chosen One of Primus Etc. was actually no big deal at all - put Rodimus at ease. He offered a smile back, warm and a touch sheepish - "So, uh, you like dancing?"

Polaris lit up like a star, all but bouncing in place on his pedes. "Oh, yes! I love to dance. That's my job, actually. I dance at Sunset House." He smiled at the brief fleeting look of surprise that crossed Rodimus's faceplate before he could hide it - although Polaris was sleek enough and looked light enough to pick up with one hand, he was far too short to be a built dancer. Then again, who among them hadn't taken on new functions they hadn't been built for, over the course of the war.

"I hope I get to see you dance sometime," Rodimus offered. "I mean, it's only fair."

Polaris giggled. "How about tonight?"

"Tonight?"

"If you're not busy."

Polaris gazed up at him, guileless and hopeful. It was an impressive effort even by Rodimus's standards, who was no stranger to guileless hopeful looks himself, and in that moment he couldn't think of a single reason not to surrender.

"For any citizen of Cybertron? Never," he said, far too solemn. Polaris giggled, which was exactly the reaction he'd been hoping for.

***

They called them the Invisible Faction.

While the Autobots and Decepticons fought (valiantly or brutally, depending on who you asked) over every scrap of energon they could find, those who chose to remain neutral had to stay out of their way and survive any way they could. Mobility and secrecy were essential; you never knew when someone with a brand would come along and ruin what little you'd managed to scrape together, so you had to be ready to run at a moment's notice. Storefronts were replaced by traveling merchants; medics went to their patients instead of the other way around. The best way to survive was to exist under the radar. Few Neutral settlements survived for long.

 _Sunset House_ was one of the few Neutral establishments to not only endure the war but outlast it, standing in the same place it had since the fall of the Golden Age. It was a cabaret of sorts, in human terms, featuring dancing, entertainment, energon (when they could get it) and occasionally more clandestine services. It had been a meeting place for opposing commanders, due to its policy of strict neutrality backed up by fearsome security mechs. Rodimus had never been inside. He hesitated to go inside now, until Polaris grasped the young Prime's large hand in his own smaller one and all but hauled him through the door like a determined tugboat.

"New friend, Pol?" greeted the mech at the door, a car model with cheery yellow, orange, and green detailing and an easy smile that took the sting out of his pinging Roddy a code of conduct (summary: "don't be an aft") as soon as he walked through the door.

Pol beamed at the grounder, fondness and excitement shining through his optics. "Sirius, this is Rodimus! He's a dancer too." Sirius turned to Rodimus and his optic ridges went up, surprise and query, and Rodimus made a 'don't look at me, I'm just along for the ride' gesture. "Anyway, I have to go get ready for my set," Pol continued. "Roddy-" _am I 'Roddy' to him already?_ Rodimus wondered - "Siri can show you around, and I'll see you after, okay?"

"Sure. Uh - good luck," Rodimus answered, suppressing the human habit of saying _break a leg_ and saving himself from having to explain the concept of jinxes as a result. Pol grinned at him and scampered off, and Rodimus turned to Sirius. "Oh, I should - you have a cover charge, right?" He reached into subspace for his credit chit.

Sirius stopped him with a light touch on his arm. "I can't take your credits, Prime," he said seriously.

Rodimus paused, then drew out his chit anyway. "Sure you can," he said, with a determined smile.

Sirius looked distinctly uncomfortable, but he allowed the Prime to fold the little card into his hand. "All right," he allowed, "but you still get the first-time discount."

"Discounts are good. I like discounts." Roddy grinned reassuringly. Sirius shook his head with a chuckle and led him out of the foyer into the House proper.

The House floor was a perfect mixture of cozy and airy, with comfortable (if charmingly mismatched) couches and loungers arranged in two semicircles facing a wide, shallow stage lacquered shimmery silver. Mechs wandered or lounged, smallish cubes of brightly-glowing high-grade in their hands, and Rodimus was gratified when Sirius pressed a similar cube into his. "Kind of a quiet night tonight," the groundmech mentioned.

Rodimus glanced around; the assembled mechs, more than a few turning to get a good look at the Prime, numbered a dozen or so, twice the size of the average Autobot strike squad. "It's usually more crowded than this?"

Sirius gave him a grin. "You should see this place when the builders are in between projects, or on holidays. Standing-room only. We're packed."

"You're pretty popular." Rodimus took a mouthful from his cube (it was quality high-grade, he was pleased to note, not the weak stuff all too common during the war; an indication that Sunset House was doing well, and a good sign for Iacon's economy) and chose a seat on one of the couches near the stage. Its other occupant, a skinny flier who couldn't take his optics off the Prime, moved over to make room. "But Sunset House has been around for a while, hasn't it?"

"Since before the war." Sirius smiled dreamily.

"How long have you been working here?"

"Not _quite_ that long." Sirius gave him a teasing grin, but Rodimus could take a hint: no prying. He settled back with his cube as the overhead lights dimmed, leaving only the wall-sconce lamps to light the room. "Pol's about to start," Sirius murmured; Rodimus gathered as much from the hush falling over the room.

"Does Polaris pole-dance?" he thought to ask in a whisper. Sirius gave him an odd look, but the stage lights were turning on to illuminate a single figure so he didn't answer, and Rodimus, again, took the hint and muted his vocalizer.

The small silhouette on the stage had no pole. He raised his arms as the music (Earth music, something from about the era the Ark crew had woken up on Earth, Roddy thought) swelled, revealing wings of gauzy material attached to his shoulders and arms. The drums crashed into the bass line, the stage was flooded with light and Polaris snapped into a spin so tight and perfect it was like he was welded to a pivot.

Rodimus's vents caught. Polaris didn't _need_ a pole - he was captivating just as he was, flowing like water over the stage. He darted to one end, opening his arms gracefully to the audience, making his gauzy drape shimmer in the spotlight. To the other end of the stage, and this time Roddy could see his dreamy smile as his fingers and the drape fluttered. Rodimus found himself smiling back.

A quick spin, back toward the center of the stage; the chorus was beginning, and Polaris brought more energy to the dance, all but bouncing on his pedes. He gestured, and the crowd started clapping in time with the music. Rodimus obligingly joined in, the beat of his palms naturally falling into the rhythm of Polaris's steps and jumps. Polaris completed a series of quick spins and dropped into a full split, flashing a brilliant grin in Rodimus's direction. Though he knew better, Rodimus let himself think that smile was just for him, and basked in it as the music faded out.

The audience erupted into applause and cheers, and Rodimus added his own voice. Polaris laughed and covered his mouth with one hand bashfully, shaking his head. Next to Rodimus, the skinny flier sighed. "Isn't he amazing?"

"I've never seen a better dancer," Rodimus agreed, truthfully enough.

"And never will again," Sirius declared, voice rich with pride and affection, and answered Rodimus's raised optic ridge with a sheepish grin. "Yeah, okay, so I'm Pol's biggest fan. I've got a right to be."

"After today, you've got some competition for that title," Rodimus told him. Sirius laughed.

Polaris vanished from the stage, returning after a few minutes on the arm of a smiling Seeker-model whose wings were clean of any sigil. The Seeker nodded politely to the Prime, but gave him no other acknowledgement - which Rodimus appreciated - and escorted Polaris through a small but enthusiastic gauntlet of well-wishers and fans. Rodimus watched as Polaris greeted them graciously, exchanging hugs and kind words and handclasps, but he stayed where he was, thoughtfully tipping his cube back and forth. His balance and movement circuitry were humming at him with the afterimages of Polaris's dance, calculating weight distribution, energy, centers of gravity for spins... it was a restless feeling, filling him up like the feeling he got right before a race or a battle. He shuttered his optics briefly, counting in binary like Magnus had taught him to control the feeling.

Sirius's voice intruded before he got to 1000000. "Do you want to go say 'good job' too, Roddy?"

 _Roddy,_ just as Polaris had called him, like they were already friends, but Sirius said it so gently that Rodimus didn't mind. Thought maybe he'd like being Roddy to Sirius, even. "Later," he said, directing a smile to the cube in his hand. "I don't want to steal his thunder with my dazzling Primely aura, you know?"

Sirius snickered. "Well, you _are_ pretty dazzling." Rodimus grinned, gratified. "But I know Pol won't mind if you wanted to go talk to him. He likes you already, I can tell. And everyone here is a regular - more like friends that come over most nights for a party."

"Except for me," Rodimus pointed out.

"Including you." Sirius plucked a decanter from the table next to him and refilled Rodimus's cube. "If you'd like."

Rodimus took a drink, to be polite - _not_ to have an excuse not to talk for a moment, thank you very much. "You're way too nice for anyone's good, Siri," he said after swallowing, deliberately using the nickname Polaris had used. Sirius's only answer was a wry cackle, not insulted at all; encouraged, Rodimus continued. "You know I won't be able to come every night. Gotta run out and save the galaxy and its outlying suburbs, and all that stuff."

"I know. We don't want to pull you from your duty," Sirius told him, optics sparkling mischievously. "...Too much."

Rodimus laughed and lifted his cube to Sirius in salute. "All right, I guess that makes me an official auxiliary regular," he announced, and Sirius laughed and pumped a victorious fist in the air.

"We've got another member of the Sunset House Regulars!" he announced, cheery voice carrying through the room, and Rodimus found himself the recipient of cheers and applause and a running tackleglomp from Polaris that (he pretended) nearly sent him backwards over the couch.

"I knew you'd love it!" Polaris beamed, optics bright as suns as Rodimus steadied the smaller mech on his lap. "I knew you'd love it here. Did you like my dancing?"

"It was amazing. You're amazing." Rodimus returned his hug, warmed by Polaris's giggling enthusiasm. "I've seen built and programmed dancers that had less skill than you. And less fun to watch." He grinned. "You even had us participating."

Polaris wriggled gleefully on his lap. "I picked that up from watching Earth performances," he confessed with a sheepish grin. "I really like Earth stuff. Their music, their dancing..."

"I know what you mean. Have you seen ballet yet?" Polaris shook his head, optics wide. "I'll bring you some recordings next time I go to Earth. The stuff they can do with their bodies is really amazing." He squeaked, not entirely theatrically, when Polaris hugged him tight again.

"You're so sweet," Polaris gushed. "Are you sure we can't keep you?"

Rodimus's spark panged. "...Tempted," he managed, and Polaris giggled and patted his back just behind his spoiler. "But eventually I do have to go be responsible. ...Eventually," he repeated firmly, looking at the cube in his hand.

Sirius knew his business; "A round for everyone on the House!" he announced, to delighted cheers. "To a night of irresponsibility."

***

Polaris's Seeker escort was named Celesti - "Lesti," he'd offered with a smile. "Siri and Pol like you enough for nicknames, therefore so do I."

"In that case, you can call me Roddy." Rodimus was half slouched in his seat, the buzz of impending overcharge having given way to a warm, mellow feeling long ago. He gave Celesti a hazy smile over his half-full cube. "So is it just you three working here?"

"Oh, no," Lesti chuckled. "There are us four stars - Centauri is off tonight, I'm afraid, he'll be devastated he missed you - and the security team and a couple of dispenser mechs, and La Lune - he's the owner of the establishment." Celesti nodded to a spot behind Rodimus, who struggled upright and craned his head around to see.

"Him?" he said, as the broad-winged lavender shuttle-mech gave him a cool, polite nod. "I thought he was the bouncer."

"He does work in that capacity, on occasion. He's very protective of us."

"Good." Rodimus turned back around and took another drink from his cube. "Good. You're all worth protecting."

"Oh, Pol was right - you _are_ sweet." Celesti gave him a warm, glowing smile that Rodimus couldn't help but return.

"I told you!" Polaris called from the stage, where he was trying to teach the skinny flier who'd shared Rodimus's couch how to do the Electric Slide. It was a difficult task, mostly owing to the fact that the flier too was overcharged and couldn't stop giggling.

"Yes, dear, you're usually right about these things," Celesti called indulgently, and turned back to Rodimus. "Pol tells me you're a dancer too, actually."

Rodimus made a dismissive gesture, belatedly realizing that cubes probably shouldn't be waved around like that when his coordination was off; Celesti helped him steady it before it could spill. "Not really," he answered sheepishly as Celesti cradled his hand. "Not professionally, at least. I was patterned partially off a famous dancer of the time, Flamestep. They just wanted me to have her athletic ability - agility, flexibility, quick reflexes, and lots of strength in a small frame, and all that. But I got a little too much of her programming along with it."

"Too much?" Lesti questioned.

Rodimus shrugged. "I was sparked restless. Couldn't concentrate. When they let me learn dance, I could focus better." He smiled apologetically. "I got to be passable at most kinds of dance, but I was best at the pole."

Celesti's optics lit in interest. "You simply must show us sometime, Roddy."

Rodimus grinned crookedly. "Sure, if you can find a pole rated for a mech my size. When I was reformatted, I went up four weight classes."

"You poor thing."

"Yeah, seriously." Rodimus swallowed down the last of his cube and blinked foggily down into its empty depths. "How many of these have I had?"

"Eight."

"Slag me, I'm over my limit." Rodimus put the cube down on the side table and heaved himself slowly to his feet, feeling like he'd just been reformatted from weight class six to weight class ten. "Listen, it was really nice to meet you - all of you. I'm definitely going to be back. But if I don't get some recharge tonight, the world will end or something."

"Oh, please don't go without saying goodbye!" Polaris all but flew off the stage, nearly upending his dance partner, and flung himself into Rodimus's arms in an enthusiastic hug that almost knocked Rodimus over for real - _I really am overcharged,_ he thought. "It was so wonderful to meet you, Roddy," Polaris told him, snuggling in against his chest. "Thank you so much for coming. You have to come back, _soon,_ you will, won't you?"

Polaris turned big gold optics up to him, and - well, it would take a harder spark to resist that than Rodimus's spark would ever be. "I'll come back," he said, returning the hug. "Soon. I promise. Thank you for being so welcoming."

"Why wouldn't we be? You're lovely."

"That... I just... aww."

One final, sparkfelt hug, and Roddy strode - okay, tottered - back out into the world, feeling warm and fuzzy and a lot better about life in general. The 'night life' of Cybertron had given way to the far more sensible 'all good little bots should be recharging right now'; the streets were quiet, the streetlamps dim. Rodimus hummed contentedly, treasuring the images of the friends he'd made today, and the way Polaris had danced.

"Prime! Prime, sir, please wait!"

Rodimus paused and peered foggily back the way he'd come. Scampering after him - not entirely in a straight line, it must be said - was Polaris's dance partner, the slender flier. Rodimus waited for him to catch up, greeting him with a smile. "Hey. You decided to leave the party a little early too, huh?"

"They were about ready to close down for the night anyway." The flier smiled up at him. "I just wanted to tell you - it was an honor to meet you. I've been wanting to for _so long."_

 _Oh Primus, he's gushing._ Rodimus fixed a smile on his face. "Thanks. Um, I'm kind of embarrassed, but I don't think I caught your name before..."

"Oh, that doesn't matter!" The flier shook his head quickly. "My name is as nothing compared to your illustrious one, great Prime." He bowed his head, but he couldn't quite hide a smirk.

Rodimus ran a few calculations in his head to calm himself down. Then he said firmly, "Starscream, get out of him."

The flier snickered, in quite another voice than the one he'd used to praise the Prime. "Oh, he's far too overcharged to know what's happening," the ghost of Starscream said dismissively, flapping a borrowed hand. "He won't even remember come the on-cycle."

"Do we need to have another talk about what consent means?" Rodimus demanded.

"Of course not, _Ultra Magnus."_

"Ouch." Rodimus shook his head. "What do you want, Starscream?"

Starscream kicked off into the air, floating on his host's repulsors with enviable effortlessness to smirk smugly down at Rodimus. "Besides a body, sweet revenge, and to rule the universe, you mean?" he asked sweetly. "Why, nothing. I came out here to offer _you_ some help, Prime."

Rodimus put his head on one side. "You. Help. How?"

"You want a dancer's pole rated for your weight class?"

"How did - you slagger, how long were you eavesdropping?"

"Long enough." Laughing at Rodimus's sour expression, Starscream draped himself - or rather, his host's self - over Rodimus's shoulder. "You know, if you want to get back into dancing, you should go to the people who perfected the art."

"Humans?" Rodimus asked idly, just to tick Starscream off.

It worked. "Brat," Starscream hissed, clocking him over the helm. "I meant the Seekers." Rodimus hesitated, thinking of Celesti back at Sunset House; Starscream made a frustrated noise. "The Seeker community in New Vos! It was the Seekers who invented midair dance, with repulsor technology-"

"Repulsors on the pole are cheating," Rodimus interrupted him flatly.

"Spoken like a true groundkisser."

"Are we really doing this, Starscream? The whole 'flier versus grounder' nonsense? Really?"

Grousing, Starscream unwound himself from Rodimus's shoulders and landed lightly on the ground. "Just think about what I said," he commanded, complete with dramatic point at Rodimus's face. "Repulsors aside, I'm trying to help you. _And_ most Seekers are weight class five or above, so a Vosian pole could handle you with ease."

"Even if that’s true, I can't go to New Vos anyway." Rodimus shrugged. "We have a noninterference treaty. If I broke it just to get a dancer's pole I'd never have time to use anyway, Magnus would drop-kick me."

"You leave the treaty to me." Starscream lifted his chin. "I am the last Emirate of old Vos. Dead or not, I can still get things done."

Rodimus shook his head, befuddlement warring with outright denial, and Starscream gave him a last smirk and turned to saunter off. "Just take him home and leave him," Rodimus called after him. "Without using his body to molest anyone else, either! I hear one complaint and I'm calling in the Ghostbusters again!"

"Spoilsport!" Starscream snapped back, and launched himself into the air; Rodimus groaned and continued his trek back home.


	2. Chapter 2

Things got busy around Autobot HQ with the discovery of a new pre-war colony; Rodimus threw himself into the work, grateful to have something to distract himself from the idea of dancing again. Yet although the political wrangling and logistical tangles did much to occupy his mind, it did nothing for his body, which was growing more restless and fidgety with each passing cycle. Not even challenging Grimlock to a sparring match did anything to alleviate it, though it did result in some interesting new dents.

As he was getting those dents hammered out, Rodimus shook himself out of pensiveness and asked, "Hey, 'Aid? Can I ask you a kinda weird question?"

"Sure," First Aid said between rhythmic taps. "Weird questions are my favorite."

Rodimus allowed himself a brief smile. "When did you know you wanted to be a medic?"

"When did I know...?" First Aid paused, tapping his mask with his fingertip. "Well... since I came online, I suppose."

"Really?"

First Aid gave his gauntlet a pat. "It's what I was built for," he explained simply. "I couldn't _not_ become what I was created to be."

"Yeah, I guess you would've been pretty miserable if someone told you you had to work accounting instead."

"Maybe," was the offhanded reply, First Aid as usual taking Rodimus's sarcastic quips seriously. "Definitely bored. Probably frustrated. But maybe not miserable, if I knew that accounting was something people needed and I was doing a good job at it." He gave his leader a smile, mostly in the visor. "I would only be miserable if someone told me I had to shoot at people instead of fixing them."

Rodimus managed to downgrade a bark of laughter into a short snerk. "I'm pretty sure your brothers would have something to say about that, anyway."

"Yeah, they're sweet that way."

This time there was wry humor in the medic's voice. Rodimus let himself laugh along, and First Aid brightened. "You're all done in here," he informed his leader, patting the newly-restored plating. "Do you want me to touch up your paint?"

"Nah, I'll do it this evening. Thanks, 'Aid." Rodimus swung his legs off the repair table and stood. "And... thanks for talking with me."

"Any time, Roddy. Any time."

Rodimus favored him with a smile, and headed back upstairs. He had a few more meetings to get through, then combat training. And then, if there was time, he had some thinking to do.

***

Starscream's presence at Autobot Headquarters, and his indefinable relationship to the young Prime, was not widely known or really understood even by the mechs involved. His welcome on Autobot-controlled Cybertron was dubious at best. Were he alive, he would have been tried for war crimes the instant he showed his face; that was the first thing Magnus suggested, in fact, and if he could have found a way to make a ghost sit still long enough for a trial he would have done it. Rodimus overruled him, in any case: Starscream had been executed by Galvatron, and that would have to be enough.

At least that fact meant that they could be certain Starscream was not working _for_ Galvatron. That was enough for Autobot command to reach an uneasy detente with the former Air Commander's shade, and an occasional working partnership. Rodimus had found that with sufficient flattery, he could benefit from Starscream's long years of experience and occasional beneficent moods - as long as he silenced the rumble of guilt that said Optimus Prime would not have approved.

He had to work extra hard to quash that rumble as he sat down in the chair Starscream gestured him to, facing the vidconsole. On the screen, Emirate Snowstorm of New Vos frowned at him from behind a faint curtain of static.

"Long time no see, Prime," he said. "Not long enough in my opinion."

Rodimus had to grin. There was something perversely likeable about Snowstorm, however not-mutual he knew the feeling was. "Nice to see you too, Emirate. You're looking well."

"Stay away from Earthen polishes and you might look as good as I do." Snowstorm shrugged. "But you didn't call to talk beauty tips. Emirate Emeritus Starscream tells me you have a proposition to make."

With a sudden (and yet, he suspected, rather belated) feeling of foreboding, Rodimus turned to look at Starscream. "What did you tell him?"

"Don't look at me, this is your diplomatic venture," Starscream huffed. "Hasn't that bore of a City Commander of yours taught you anything?"

Rodimus almost snapped back, victim of a sudden protective bristle. But he couldn't hope to impress Snowstorm if he stopped now to defend Magnus's honor. "This isn't widely known," Rodimus said, turning back to the current Emirate's image, "but I'm a built dancer of Flamestep's line. I haven't danced in a while," he hurried to add before Snowstorm's expression of frank disbelief could find expression in his vocalizer, "but with so much of our culture lost, we have to reclaim and record what little left we can find. It's up to me to lead the way in Iacon."

Rather than snark again as Roddy had expected, Snowstorm looked thoughtful. "There are similar programs here,” he admitted, frowning offscreen. “But that still doesn’t explain what you’re calling me for.”

“Well… that’s the other thing.” Roddy leaned back, fighting a grin. “I’m a _pole_ dancer.”

“Get out.”

“Truth.”

Snowstorm pointed an accusatory finger. “I’ve read your specs, Prime, you weren’t even sparked when Vos fell. How the slag did you learn pole dancing?”

“I’d be happy to tell the whole story to your chronicler.”

Snowstorm’s vents wheezed in outrage, and Roddy’s grin finally won out. Behind him, he heard Starscream chuckle - he’d finally stolen a march on the Emirate, and he hadn’t even needed Magnus feeding him lines over the comm to do it.

“I’m almost tempted.” Snowstorm propped his elbow on his console sourly. “I’ll even admit I’m curious. But there’s no way in the Pits I can let the Prime into Vos, even if you could do the Dance of Thirteen Veils standing on your head. My councilors would mutiny.”

Roddy tapped his chin. “You don’t have to let me into the city proper. If I could just borrow a pole rated for a weight class six-”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous!” Starscream burst out, and Rodimus felt the cool tingle of the ghost’s palm across the back of his helm in a reproving swat. “This is an opportunity, both of you. You can’t possibly shy away now.” He put his hands on Rodimus’s shoulders, making him shiver. “Snowstorm, imagine the Autobot Prime dancing for the glory of Vos.”

“Now wait a minute,” Roddy muttered.

“Imagine the Vosians _honoring_ the Prime for dancing for them.”

Rodimus began to get a funny feeling he was not completely in control here. He consoled himself that neither was Snowstorm, who was musing over Starscream’s words rather than leveling that suspicious squint of his at the pair of them. “Prime, you’ll perform on the pole to show honor to Vos?”

Roddy swallowed his pride. It tasted awful. “Sure. I just need a sturdy pole and some time to practice.”

“There’ll be an arts expo in twenty rotational cycles. Is that enough time?”

_Oh, Primus, is he serious?_ “Plenty of time,” Rodimus answered, forcing a confidence he didn’t feel into his voice.

Snowstorm nodded once, then added, “But you can’t enter Vos as the Prime.”

“Leaving the Matrix behind is not an option,” Roddy told him flatly.

Snowstorm rolled his optics. “Then it looks like you’re gonna have to get repainted.” This time it was Roddy’s turn to splutter. “Look, we can reveal your identity at the expo, but twenty days of the chief Autobot knocking around Vos is nineteen days too long. Fix your paint, get a new identifier beacon, lay low as best you can and get your dancing up to spec before the show. At least you’ve got some kind of winglike structures,” the Emirate muttered as an afterthought. “Maybe you won’t stick out like a sore aileron.”

_Well, excuse me very much for having wheels._ “Okay, I get it. ...Thanks, Emirate Snowstorm.”

“Just don’t make me regret this.” Snowstorm disconnected.

Rodimus leaned back to catch a glimpse of his ghostly advisor. “That went… well, it went.”

Starscream didn’t answer right away - his optics were narrow, staring at the darkened screen. Rodimus felt his spark sink. “Starscream? Does that look mean I’m about to step on a land mine?”

Starscream startled, wings flicking. “That - no. No, you’ll be fine. I just don’t _like_ that mech.” He huffed theatrically. “ _‘Emirate Emeritus,’_ indeed!”

***

"Magnus won't be happy."

Rodimus glanced back at Arcee, a little grin teasing across his face. "He rarely is." Arcee didn't look amused. "Maybe you should take him on a vacation while I'm gone. Shake those old bolts loose a bit."

That at least got a snort from his friend. "To make that mech take a vacation, I'd have to knock him out, tie him down, and drag him there. And then I'd have to _explain_ the concept of a vacation. I'd probably have to use flow charts." Roddy snickered, and finally Arcee cracked a grin. "But in the meantime I have to tell him _something_ about where you're going. You know how he worries."

Rodimus sighed. Yes, he knew how Magnus worried - it was practically all he did. Rodimus sometimes thought Magnus thought that their crazy Prime would fling himself right into the nearest sun if Magnus wasn't there to hold his hand. "Tell him I'm taking some personal leave time," he said. "And that I'm not going off-planet. He won't like it, but he'll accept it." He shoved the last of his gear into his subspace. "I won't be gone that long, okay, 'Cee? I'm pretty sure the planet won't burn down while I'm gone."

He'd meant it as a joke, but Arcee didn't smile. "Is this because of that video?" she asked quietly.

Trust Arcee to see right through him. "Kind of," he admitted. "It... brought up some things."

"You don't have to prove anything." Arcee moved closer, laying a gentle hand on his arm. "You know that, right?"

Rodimus hesitated, then shook his head. "I kind of do have something to prove," he answered, taking her hand. "But only to myself - as Roddy, not the Prime."

Arcee glanced down at their joined hands, optics dim and thoughtful. "You realize what I have to say now," she said.

" 'Good luck'?"

She smirked. " 'Break a leg.' Also if you come back in pieces I'll kick your aft."

Rodimus laughed and pulled her to him in a hug that made her plates creak. "I promise, I'll come back in one piece. Try not to let anyone wreck the place while I'm gone."

"Nuh-uh." Arcee grinned up at him. "I'll be too busy getting Magnus to take a vacation. Ask someone else."

"Well, I guess I could ask Blurr..."

"We're doomed."

***

"So. New Vos."

Starscream, floating next to him, crossed his arms smugly. "New Vos."

"Dancing Seekers?"

"The best dancers on the planet."

"Not that you're biased or anything."

Starscream snorted. "Just because I'm biased," he informed the Prime, "doesn't mean I'm not right."

"Uh huh." Rodimus shook his head, and on impulse glanced behind him at the road leading to Iacon. _Not too late to turn back._

Except if he turned back now, Starscream would never let him hear the end of it. Besides, it would be a shame to waste the two hours he'd spent getting repainted into something less obnoxiously recognizable, a dark green that muttered ‘cargo hauler’ as loudly his old paint had screamed ‘high performance’. The incognito Rodimus transformed and rolled, taking the last leg of the journey to the half-rebuilt city of New Vos.

Six of the seven spires of Vos were broken: the seventh was ringed at different heights with twinkling lights, flight markers for the mechs that lived there. The spire had once been called Bridgeway, the entry point where Vosians and the rest of Cybertron mingled, and connected to the other spires via a network of suspension bridges and floating gondolas. Now Bridgeway was the sole livable tower left, and it was deliberately cut off from the rest of Cybertron by road. The Seekers of Vos had always been clannish, but following the loss of a hundred thousand of their number to war and Unicron, the ones remaining had become positively isolationist. Hence Snowstorm’s secretiveness, and his refusal to send a private shuttle to pick the Prime up. Rodimus would have to negotiate his own ride.

The road ended abruptly, close enough to New Vos that Rodimus could make out the shapes of the Seekers flying around their tower. The tower itself was a lot more whole than it had been the last time Rodimus had seen it. Clearly the Emirate had been busy since the treaty had been signed. Cycling his vents once, Rodimus opened a comm line. _//Hailing New Vos, requesting parley.//_

They made him wait for an answer, typically, during which Starscream grumbled invisibly from somewhere trailer-ward. _//The Emirate is busy, Autobot. Go away and come back tomorrow.//_

"I’ll bet he is!" Starscream snorted.

"It's rude to eavesdrop," Rodimus muttered.

_//Say again?//_

_//Sorry, talking to someone else. Listen, this is a personal errand. There's no need to bother the Emirate.//_

_//If this isn't official business, then why the slag should we care?//_

"Good question," Rodimus muttered, careful to keep his voice off the comm this time. Starscream, laughing, shimmered into visibility atop his trailer.

"Why shouldn't they care?" he singsonged. "Why shouldn't they want to see the Prime dance for them?"

"Why should they? _I can't fly!"_ Rodimus snapped.

"I thought we weren't doing that anymore."

"...I hate it when you do that." Rodimus turned back to the comm with a grumble. _//I have it on very good authority-//_ Starscream preened - _//-that Seekers are among the best dancers in the galaxy. Is that true?//_

_//Of course.//_

_//Then I'm here because I want to see how I stack up against them.//_

There was a pause, then a bark of laughter. _//You've got bearings, I'll say that much. You dance?//_

_I used to,_ Rodimus wanted to demur, but modesty was only a virtue in Iacon. _//I'm a pole dancer of Flamestep's model line.//_

_//Holy slag.//_ The comm line clicked off.

"He hung up on me," Rodimus complained.

"Wait for it," Starscream advised.

Rodimus huffed through his vents, letting out an irritated puff of steam. Then his comm pinged again and he hurried to answer it.

_//So you're the Autobot as thinks he can dance?//_ It was a new voice, brusque and challenging.

Rodimus took a deep, steadying cycle through his vents and forced Hot Rod's cheerful brashness into his reply. _//I know I can.//_

A snort that might almost have had a laugh behind it. _//This should be interesting. I'm Skyquake, dancemaster of Vos.//_ Rodimus let out an impressed exclamation. _//You got my attention, groundmech, so I'm gonna give you a chance. I'm authorizing a gondola. Get ready to impress me.//_

_//Thank you! I mean - I will. Count on it.//_ Rodimus cut the comm line and sank back, dizzy with victory. "Well, blow my tires. I got the dancemaster's attention."

"Flamestep's name carries currency," Starscream told him, even as he faded into invisibility. "Even today, even among Seekers."

"And I thought going incognito would mean I wouldn't have to live up to anybody's legacy."

Rodimus carefully kept his sensors pointed away from Starscream, but he couldn't help but hear the ghost's derisive snort at that. But Starscream didn't elaborate, and something else grabbed his attention: a single-occupant trackless gondola coming steadily closer.

It was only a drone, a nonsentient machine programmed to go from point A to point B and back, but the Seekers had built it along tetrajet lines, sleek and vaguely menacing. It pulled up alongside the cliff, just far enough away that Rodimus's entrance was ungraceful. He recovered from the desperate stretch-and-stumble and flopped into the seat. "Onward to glory!" he told it.

The gondola, unimpressed, pulled smoothly away and pointed its nosecone toward Bridgeway. Roddy settled in for the ride, the faint cold tingle of Starscream's presence following him all the way.

***

When he emerged from the gondola, not one but three Seekers were waiting for him. Rodimus addressed the one whose expression wasn't openly dubious. "Skyquake, I presume."

He'd guessed correctly; the Seeker gave him a curt nod. He was tall even for a Seeker build, painted primer-gray all over save for maroon stripes on his wings. Once, Rodimus had read somewhere, subtleties of color and design had indicated tower of origin and profession among residents of Vos. But with only one tower left and few Vosians having remained civilian, he couldn't begin to guess if the old conventions still remained or what had taken their place. He wondered if Starscream knew, but he'd have to wait until they were alone to ask: although he could feel the prickle of the ghost's presence, Starscream remained invisible and silent in the presence of these strangers.

They were waiting for him to introduce himself; Rodimus smiled but didn't offer his hand. "Highway," he said, using the name of one of his squadmates, long dead by the time news of the Ark's survival reached them. "Nice to meet you."

"You don't look like a dancer," one of Skyquake's attendants blurted. The other swatted at him while Rodimus grimaced.

"Yeah, I got an upgrade during the war," he said - which was technically true. "But I still remember all the forms. I can still dance."

"I'll be the judge of that," Skyquake informed him, but he was grinning in open amusement. "These glitches are my studio managers. Cloudstreaker and Darkwing."

Rodimus paused mid-nod. "Darkwing? As in-"

The deep violet Seeker glowered. "Don't judge me."

***

With an escort of three prominent Vosians, Rodimus got his share of odd looks from the populace but no harassment. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting - disguise or not, surely he wasn't the first grounder to walk the streets here! - but not only was he stared at like a sideshow, but New Vos was clearly not designed for people without repulsors. Past the landing dock for the gondolas, Cloudstreaker and Darkwing had to physically pick him up and haul him to a higher walkway. And then lower him down to another one, despite his insistence that he could make that jump. They'd looked like they thought Rodimus would crack his fool helm open on landing if they let him get airborne. _Seekers._

So it was an awkward journey to the studio spire. The dance studio proper was at the top level of the mostly-rebuilt tower (of course! Rodimus groaned inwardly) that marked the south end of Vos's art district. "Come on," Skyquake said in a wryly commisserating tone, "one more lift." Rodimus wasn't sure who Skyquake was trying to buck up, him or the studio managers who'd been doing all the lifting, but he lifted his helm and smiled anyway.

"Almost home," Cloudstreaker agreed hopefully. He hooked an arm through Rodimus's in a hold that had become all too familiar.

"Good," Rodimus answered with feeling, making his escorts chuckle. Darkwing took his other arm, and together they ascended.

Floor by floor: Rodimus could catch glimpses of offices, residences, playgrounds, layer on layer like geological strata. Floor by floor, broad stripes of color and life. Here, a Seeker sat at the window, tatting a roll of steelsilk into a long cloth of dizzying lace patterns that streamed into the wind. Two floors up, a bright green Decepticon symbol was painted in a window. Still further up, two lightly-built Seekers were discovering the joys of water balloons - well, coolant balloons, water being essentially nonexistent on Cybertron - at the expense of the grouchy-looking older flier with a scarred wing on the floor below. "New builds," Cloudstreaker snorted. "No respect." Rodimus wisely muffled a snicker.

"Once we wouldn't have had to share a tower with a bunch of newbuilds," Skyquake called down to them as they left the scene behind. "The dance guild had a tower all to themselves."

"Once, Vos was seven spires and energon flowed on us from the skies," Darkwing shot back. "Update your chronological parameters, you old wreck!"

Skyquake was built stocky for a Seeker, almost grounderlike with his thick arms and legs, but in his quick, flawless midair turn Rodimus saw what made him Vos's dancemaster. Repulsors boomed as Skyquake launched himself at Darkwing, and Darkwing wisely fled from his wrath - though that left Rodimus dangling by one arm from Cloudstreaker's surprised grip. "Whoa, hey now!" he yelped.

"Hey!" Cloudstreaker's shout was much more aggrieved as he struggled with the weight of a class-six repulsorless mech on his own. Getting an arm around his burden's waist, he brought Rodimus to a balcony to rest his weight on.

"Do they often do this?" Rodimus asked, gratefully rotating his wrenched arm.

Cloudstreaker scowled at the distant shapes of Skyquake and Darkwing chasing each other around the sky. "Idiots," he snorted.

Rodimus allowed himself a grin, reminded far too much of certain adventures of his own. "It's kind of cute," he commented.

Cloudstreaker spluttered a laugh. "I've never heard that applied to the dancemaster before. You're an odd creature, Highway."

"Grounder," Rodimus pointed out innocently.

"Yeah right. Bet even the grounders think you're odd."

"It's been remarked," Rodimus admitted with a shameless grin. "But I'm blazing hot, so that makes up for it."

Cloudstreaker snickered. "Are you sure you're not a Seeker in disguise?"

_Half right,_ Rodimus thought.

***

The dance studio was all windows, providing a full view of the surroundings: the bulk of the spire to the north, open sky to the south, traffic to the east and west. Beyond the eastern horizon lay Iacon; Roddy gazed out the window in that direction briefly, wondering what his friends were doing right now, and Cloudstreaker let him be, fussing at the just-entering Darkwing and Skyquake again.

"I can't believe the dignity of the studio rests on your wings. The pair of you are as bad as each other-"

"-hey, don't give me that slag! I'm the dancemaster!"

"Hence! My! Embarrassment!"

The studio wasn't empty, but none of the dancers so much as flickered a wing in their direction, so apparently the dancemaster getting scolded was nothing new around here. Rodimus turned his attention to them, indulging his curiosity. Most of them were doing self-maintenance or warm-ups, but there was one dancer who was putting on some music before returning to what looked to be his twin, identical in all respects except his color, which was a bright, glittering apple green to the first dancer's deep ruby. The two of them stood across from each other with a slim and shiny dancer's pole between them, staring into one another's optics with deceptive calmness as the music played through its opening bars. On the downbeat both of them grasped the pole and mounted it.

"Wow," Roddy murmured. The two Seekers struck mirrored poses and held them, rotating slowly, braced against each other as much as the pole itself. Both backs arched, repulsors whirred; the two of them flipped upside down with one leg each hooked together. Their spin reversed direction and sped up, gentle pulses from their repulsors keeping them in motion. The display was not something Rodimus was confident he could ever replicate, even given a partner as in sync with him as the two Seekers were with each other. The dancing he’d learned was energetic, fast-paced, designed to stretch his athletic ability to its limit; this was slower, almost dreamlike, and undeniably erotic in intent.

"Firejewel and Etherjewel," Darkwing murmured next to him. "Spark-split twins. Stars of every production we put on, no matter who's dancing on the center pole."

Rodimus risked a glance. Darkwing was frowning at the pair, optics narrow; he was jealous and didn't care who knew it. Looking back at the twins, Roddy had to admit he couldn't blame him. The two were dazzling, both as sleek as Hot Rod had been, tall, strong - built to dance. It made Rodimus a little envious himself.

The music ended. Firejewel and Etherjewel disengaged from a tangled mid-pole embrace with as much indifferent grace with which they danced. Only then did they deign to approach, chins lifted and optics narrowed in an expression Roddy recognized: 'acknowledge our superiority, lowly grounder.'

"And what," the dark one said coolly, leveling a finger at Roddy's face, "is this?"

Roddy vented to stay calm, but Darkwing was bristling enough for both of them anyway. "He is Skyquake's guest," he snapped. "And will be treated as such."

_You weren't too keen on me yourself before,_ Rodimus thought, flicking an amused glance Darkwing's way. _Have you warmed up to me that much, or are you just in opposition to them?_ Meanwhile, both twins were glaring at him like he'd brought the whole war to the dance studio. "Highway," he greeted them with a determined smile. "You're not bad on the pole." Were amazing on the pole, truthfully, but piling on the flattery only worked on Starscream.

"Yes, well. Feel honored you got to see it." The bright Seeker shrugged insolently. "We're not a tourist attraction."

"I'm not a tourist. I'm a dancer."

Even their doubletakes were perfectly in sync. _"You?"_

"Yeah!" Darkwing was grinning, eager to press the advantage now that the twins were on the back pede. "He's Iacon's premier pole dancer, designed with Flamestep's own programming specs!" _Oh, Primus, he's talking me up,_ Rodimus thought with an internal groan. "Come on, Highway," Darkwing urged. "Show us what you can do."

Rodimus didn't need to look to know that every optic was on him. This was what he had come for, and he was ready despite the nervous flutter that Daniel called "butterflies in your stomach." He bestowed a smile on Darkwing's eager face. "Be glad to."

There was a soft hiss of drawn-in air from excited vents all over the room, and at least one mutter of "This ought to be interesting", probably from one of the twins. "What music?" asked a smaller green Seeker, moving to the music console.

"Got my own." Roddy pinged a file to the player, which immediately loaded it to the master playlist and hit play. The music burst forth with an aggressive wail of Earthen guitars; Roddy surged up the nearest pole.

At first he wasn't even thinking about his form, just dancing for the fierce joy of it. His metal sang as he spun, arching into it, feeling the pole vibrate with the race of his engine. Even his greater weight served him, pulling him into faster spins. Roddy leaned back, letting his thighs grip the pole to hold him upside-down - and slipped, saving himself a nasty knock on the helm only by clenching hard at the last second.

"Amateur," he heard somebody sneer.

_Oh, slag you!_ Rodimus thought furiously. He did a sit-up with the beat and clambered his way up the pole again.

_The friction coefficient isn't what I'm used to,_ he told himself. _I guess antigrav technology makes friction less vital._ But that didn't mean a grounder _couldn't_ dance on a Seeker pole. Rodimus proved it by reversing his grip, swinging his torso out from the pole by arm strength alone and holding the pose until he heard vents gasp in disbelief. The music eased into its bridge, and Rodimus followed it, collapsing slowly into an upside-down spiral. One more burst of activity, exuberant but controlled, and as the music faded out Rodimus flipped off the pole onto his knees, back arched, grasping the pole above his head. He heard a few engines race and grinned.

"Was that... Earth music?" breathed the green Seeker as Roddy relaxed.

"Yeah."

"It's totally shiny."

Rodimus chuckled and the young flier grinned. Firejewel sneered at them and Etherjewel pretended to be bored, but both of the yielded to Skyquake cycling his vents meaningfully. Rodimus looked up, awaiting the Seeker's judgement.

"Your technique's rusty as hell," he began. Rodimus ducked his head - it was a valid criticism, when he hadn't danced since he'd first touched ground on Earth. "You're too impatient, and the poles we use aren't suited to grounders unless you're willing to get a reformat to a repulsor-equipped frame. But I reckon you're teachable."

_"Skyquake!"_ the twins protested.

Much like Rodimus, who was grinning in astonished victory, Skyquake ignored them. "I'm putting you in Airstream class - that's the intermediate class taught by Sterling. Impress her and I'll bump you up to my own class."

Rodimus rose to his pedes. "Bring it on."

Skyquake cracked a smile at that. "Don't lay on the overconfidence too thick, grounder."

"Me? Never."

The twins were sputtering inelegantly; Darkwing made no secret of laughing at them as he clapped Rodimus on the shoulder. "Come on, Highway. I'll show you to the Airstream classroom."

"I'll come with." The green flier hopped to her pedes. "I'm Boomer, by the way. I want to hear more Earth music!"

***

Rodimus played Earth music for Boomer, Darkwing, and a slowly-growing collection of curious dancers before they had to clear the room for the beginners' class. The beginners were mostly smaller-model Seekers, some of whom waved at Boomer in a friendly fashion and all of whom stared at Rodimus until they were ushered past by their teacher. Darkwing took his leave of them at that point, citing administrative duties to attend to (though he referred to it the way Rodimus would have, as "more useless forms to fill out"); at Rodimus's request, Boomer took him to the residential floor and showed him to a guest room he could rest in until it was time for his class.

There wasn't much floor space in the guest room, but Rodimus was inspired enough to make it work anyway, dancing a quick floor routine to the beat of music playing only in his own head. He was amazed at how easily the forms came back to him, even after all this time. His spins became faster, his gestures more exuberant; without a mirror or camera to hand, he couldn't tell how his changed body was handling the steps, but it felt so good to just _move_ that he didn't care. For the first time since he'd claimed the Matrix, Rodimus felt like himself again.

The song in his head spun down to a close, and Rodimus let it guide him down to sprawl in the hammock (Vosians apparently preferred hammocks to berths, and they were surprisingly comfortable). His body hummed warmly from the activity, lulling Rodimus into a gentle state of pre-recharge relaxation. So far, his vacation in Vos was going just fine.

"Hate to admit it, but Starscream was right," he murmured.

After a moment he flickered on his optics, disturbed by the continued silence. Normally a pronouncement like that would have been followed by crowing and preening from a certain ghostly Seeker. "Starscream?" he called again, feeling his tank sink.

A patch of the opposite wall shimmered. _"What?"_

_Relief._ "Just checking," he assured Starscream's misty shape. The ghost frowned crankily at him and Rodimus shrugged. "I've heard things about Vosian exorcisms."

"You and your scare-the-newbuild stories," Starscream huffed, lounging in midair as if in an invisible hammock. Rodimus hid a smile and settled back in his far more substantial one, content to drift into recharge now that all his pieces were in place.


	3. Chapter 3

Sterling turned out to be a silvery-green Seeker with an Earthen alt, and Rodimus pretended not to be surprised - he'd thought he'd seen all the Seekers who saw service on Earth. Sterling, by contrast, took one look at Rodimus and said, "You've got to be kidding."

"Skyquake seemed to be impressed," Rodimus said before Darkwing or Boomer could leap to his defense. "If you're not, that's okay, but at least let me show you what I can do first."

"Skyquake is overly impressed by bravado," Sterling grunted. "Don't expect me to catch you if you fall and crack your cranium." Rodimus chortled and the teacher glared. "What?"

"My first dance teacher said the same thing."

Sterling's lips twitched in a reluctant grin. "At least you're persistent. Fine, then, grab a pole. And the rest of you," she whirled to face the knot of Seekers boggling at the scene from the doorway, "quit gawking like tourists and get your afts on a pole!"

The students leapt to obey like recruits snapped into line by their commander, and Rodimus had to smother a laugh. He climbed a pole in the back of the classroom and rested there, watching as the classroom filled up with aspiring dancers taking their chosen perches. In the mirror that stretched along the entire length of the front wall, Rodimus stuck out like a sore antenna. Red optics gleamed in the mirror, flicking narrowly toward him and away, coupled with mutterings just on the edge of his hearing. His threat-assessment software kicked up despite his best intentions - incognito or not, he was an Autobot among Decepticons and a grounder among fliers, and that translated in his war-forged processor as Danger. He cycled slow, killing the alerts one at a time as Sterling took her place at the center of class.

“Class is starting now,” she announced, glaring at the entire front row. Every gaze snapped to hers and the muttering died down; Rodimus’s estimation of her rose several notches. “Fifteen rotations until the expo, winglets - and not a one of you is fit to dance in public. That’s what I’m here to change.” She let a smirk show at the edge of her faceplates. “If any of you want to bail out, now’s the time.”

***

Rodimus stumbled out of the classroom and right into Boomer, who struggled to keep him upright. With the help of a nearby wall, they managed it in the end. “Sterling kicked your tailpipe?” Boomer guessed.

“And how.” Rodimus gave her an apologetic grin. “Great class though. What about you, waiting for your class?”

Boomer looked startled. “Oh, I’m not a dancer, just a floating sound tech. Because I don’t have a trine,” she added abruptly, as though thinking of something she ought to have told him but didn’t.

“Oh. ...sorry.” There were clearly cultural subtleties that Rodimus wasn’t getting, but he understand Boomer’s embarrassed look just fine. “That’s right, you were doing the music for the advanced class.”

Boomer nodded. “That’s why I was looking for you, actually. I wanted to run some of your Earth music through my mixer, see if I can get it to work better with our speakers.”

“It sounded fine to me.”

Boomer’s expression changed to one of gentle amusement. “You’re not a sound-physics nerd.”

“Ah.” Rodimus chortled. “In that case, count me in. I’m fully supportive of nerds.” That earned a laugh from Boomer, and Roddy grinned in victory.

***

They found an empty studio, and Boomer played with bass lines and vocals while Rodimus - once his hand cramps had eased - practiced what he’d learned in Sterling’s class. “I swear you Vosians grease these poles,” he grunted the third time he slipped.

“Maybe you should get some of the lead out of your aft,” Boomer teased, and Rodimus gave her a rude engine-noise in response. “I guess grounder poles are different, huh?”

“They had kind of a velvety texture,” Rodimus agreed. “But they were built for a weight class four or lower, so I can’t use them anymore.”

“Why not just get unreformatted?” Boomer suggested, and Rodimus hid a wince under a grunt of effort as he mounted the pole again. “I mean, the war’s over. More or less. Surely there’s less call for warbuild frames.”

Rodimus reversed his grip and leaned back, weighing his answer. Experience had taught him he was a very bad liar, but it wasn’t always necessary to lie in order to keep a secret. “The galaxy’s still a dangerous place,” he answered, stretching out his legs and spinning slowly in place. “There will always be a need for warbuilds.”

Boomer was quiet for a moment, mulling that over. “...don’t take this the wrong way, but you sound like a Decepticon.”

_Thunk,_ went Rodimus’s aft on the hard metal floor. “Wh- _ow,”_ he complained, but Boomer’s words were still a greater source of shock than the impact. Of all the things he hadn’t expected-! He glanced up and accidentally met Boomer’s optics - she looked as shocked as he felt.

“I - I’m sor-” Boomer began, but the rest was lost when Rodimus burst out laughing. After a moment, Boomer joined in.

***

“Making friends already, Autobot? How sweet.”

Rodimus held himself stiff: if he jumped, the people around him would notice. He glared skyward. A ghostly, floating cackle was his response, and a glimmer of pale light in an alley. He glanced at his companions - Boomer and a few of the younger ones, totally absorbed by the light-painting display they’d tugged Roddy along to. They wouldn’t miss him for a few minutes. Probably.

“Jealous, Starscream?” he hiss-whispered as he entered the alley.

“I wasn’t making fun.” Starscream, the soul of innocence. Literally. “I think it’s adorable. They’ve taken such a shine to you. I wonder if they’ll feel the same way when your true identity is revealed?”

Disquieted, Rodimus leaned against the wall. “What do you need to tell me that can’t wait until I get back to quarters?”

“I won’t be in your quarters tonight. Possibly not the night after either.” Now Starscream let Rodimus see him - just a little, the sharp edges of his form edged with diffuse sparklight. His expression was narrow, grim in a way that worried Rodimus.

“What’s going on?” he asked, though he wasn’t sure his traveling companion would answer, or tell him the truth if he did.

Starscream’s expression didn’t change; he didn’t look at Rodimus. “Probably nothing you will ever need worry about.”

“...yeah, so, not really reassuring me here.”

The edge of Starscream’s mouth gleamed as it curved into a reluctant smirk. “Worry about your performance. I’ll be in touch.” His image faded, leaving Rodimus alone in the alley.

“Highway! Hey, there you are!”

Preoccupied as he was, Rodimus only remembered he was answering to that name when Boomer and her friends surrounded him. He pasted on a smile. “Hey, sorry. It was getting a little crowded out there.”

Boomer gave him a worried look, but offered, “We’re going to go to the fly-by. Do you want to come with us?”

“...the what?”

Boomer’s nearest companion, a silver-winged youngling with soft rose striping, widened his optics. “Ohhh. You wouldn’t have those in Iacon.” He took Rodimus’s hand, fearless and unthinking, and tugged. “Come on. It’s nice, you’ll like it.”

“Comet, he can’t fly,” argued a gold-trimmed blue one. “How’s he going to get up there?”

Comet blinked, as though the question itself was confusing. “How did he get up to the dance tower?”

“...oh.” Blue-and-Gold turned a speculative optic Rodimus’s way. “But he’s… kinda big.”

Rodimus lifted his hands. “It’s okay, really. Some other time. I’ll rent a gravsled or something - um.” He paused as Boomer hooked her elbow through his and grinned.

“There’s four of us and one of him,” she pointed out. “If we all grab a limb-”

“Oh. Uh. This maybe isn’t a good idea-”

Too late. Youngling Vosians were as enthusiastic as youngling Hot Rods when they got ahold of a Great Idea, it seemed, and about as quick to act when they had one. Rodimus found himself floating on four sets of antigravs, none of them quite in sync with each other, though Boomer quickly took charge of their general direction. Up they went, circling the spire and shouting to each other and trying not to tug Rodimus in four different directions at once and not always succeeding, getting a few double-takes from older Vosians as they went. A resigned Rodimus supposed he couldn’t blame them for staring. This mode of travel was about as dignified as it was comfortable, and it wasn’t comfortable at all.

The ‘flyby’ turned out to be a sort of goodie shop set out on the edge of one of Bridgeway’s highest towers. Boomer and her friends settled themselves and Rodimus at the counter, eagerly watching as artfully-arranged goodies in small dishes traveled toward them on a shiny silver conveyor belt. It was apparently called a flyby because the conveyor belt extended past the boundaries of the tower itself, allowing passers-by on the wing to grab a treat and pay for it with a credit chip without hardly slowing down.

Comet got the prized position at the head of the line, closest to the oncoming conga line of confections. He peered down the line, picked up one of the dishes as it passed him and reached over Boomer to plunk it down in front of Rodimus.

“First one’s on me,” he announced, as Rodimus blinked at the delicately-shaped confection and the Vosian on the end of the line groaned.

“That’s my favorite, too,” ei complained. Rodimus tried to pass it to hir, but ei waved it off with a laugh; “There’ll be another one along in a klick.”

Ei was right: the conveyor belt brought to them a variety of goodies in every shade in the visible spectrum, including a couple of the same type Rodimus had in front of him. As his companions chose their treats and dug in with every indication of enjoyment, Rodimus picked up a piece of his own treat and ate it cautiously.

“Hey, that’s… really good.”

Boomer grinned at him. “This is my favorite place to get goodies. The only bad thing is it gets really crowded at shift-changes.”

“Yeah, same as Iacon.” Rodimus grinned back. “Goodies are sold from stalls there, and there’s a queue around the block every shift-change. Or at least there is if the treats are any good.”

Comet squinted faintly. “...what’s a queue?”

“...um.”

It wasn’t that ‘wait your turn’ was a foreign concept, as it turned out, but the image of standing in one line along the ground proved a little hard to understand for fliers, whose spatial understanding worked in more directions than Rodimus’s did. “I’m not explaining it well,” he admitted finally with an apologetic shrug. “They do it on Earth as well as in Iacon, so I’m just used to it.”

“That’s right, you were on Earth,” observed blue-and-gold.

“That’s why he’s shaped a little funny,” fuschia-and-green on the end pointed out, and grinned apologetically when Rodimus gave hir an arch look. “It’s not a _bad_ funny. Just interesting.”

“I’d like to go to Earth someday,” Comet said dreamily, and Rodimus blinked when the other three quickly turned and shushed him. “Oh - right,” Comet admitted, wings hunching, “not outside the studio. Sorry.”

Rodimus looked from one side to the other to his suddenly tense companions. “...something I should know?” he asked cautiously.

“It’s… complicated,” Boomer winced. “You won’t get arrested or anything…”

“Probably,” muttered fuschia-and-green darkly.

“-but, hey, you’re here,” Boomer pointed out brightly. “So maybe they’re lightening up a little!”

“Hope so,” Comet sighed, swinging his legs. Watching him, Rodimus found himself wishing very dearly for Starscream - so he could grab the ghost and shake him until _what the frag was going on in this city_ fell out.

***

“No, no - Primus, you’re stiff. Off the pole, watch me.”

Rodimus allowed himself to be shooed off the pole, engine rumbling faintly in embarrassment as Sterling claimed it with a quick repulsor-hop. “Swing your leg out and up as you spin,” she instructed, demonstrating physically as she spoke, “and don’t forget to arch your back. Give the audience a show they can rev to.”

Rodimus squirmed uncomfortably. “Do I really have to try for the sexy thing?”

Sterling slid down the pole again. “Something wrong with sexy?”

“No, of course not. Just not the style I learned.”

Sterling huffed her vents at him. “Mechling, pole dancing was _invented_ by Vosian pleasure models. Don’t turn up your Iaconian nose at dancing to rev engines - you’re in New Vos now. And what do we say about hot mechs in New Vos, class?” she sang out, addressing the rest of the dancers.

“Sexy is power is sexy!” the class chorused back, as Rodimus marinated in embarrassment.

“Slagging right.” Sterling turned back to Rodimus. “Now try again.”

_This is what I signed up for,_ Rodimus reminded himself, gripping the pole and doing a spin to build up his momentum and his courage. With one leg wrapped around the pole, he swung his other leg out straight, arching his back until it sang with the strain of it.

Someone whistled appreciatively. Rodimus couldn’t help but grin.

“That’s better,” Sterling assured him. “Keep it up.” She walked away, seeing to the rest of her small forest of students. _Ten days ‘til the expo,_ Rodimus reminded himself. _And I still haven’t impressed Sterling enough for her to send me to Skyquake’s class._ Determined, he slid to the floor again before remounting, watching himself in the mirror to make sure his flag pose was flawless.

And sexy. Roddy grinned at himself in the mirror. _Ten days? No problem._

“Time,” Sterling called, and Rodimus pulled both legs in and performed a showy sliding dismount. The mech next to him scoffed as Sterling continued. “Hit the showers, then hit the baths. I’ll see you back here next on-cycle.”

As the Seekers began to crowd out the door, Rodimus rebooted a few banks of circuits to make sure his audials weren’t malfunctioning. “Showers, _then_ baths?”

The umber-winged Seeker who’d scoffed at him had occasion to do it again. “Haven’t you been to the baths yet?”

Rodimus stared at him. “What baths?”

***

New Vos interior spaces tended toward the tall rather than the wide - naturally, for a people who all had repulsors, and whose cities tended to soar rather than sprawl. Rodimus found himself at the lowest level of the tallest room he’d yet seen: multiple tiers of deep pools filled with sharp-smelling green cleanser oil heated until the room itself filled with mist. Each level of the pool was filled with Seekers lounging and soaking up the warmth, chattering with a thousand voices. It was a scene out of a prewar datatrack, a display of luxury that felt almost obscene to Rodimus’s sensibilities.

He must have been gawking; the Seeker who’d volunteered to help him here (Blazewing, his name was, though Rodimus had learned that by overhearing rather than introduction) chortled. “Don’t have these in Iacon, huh?”

“Not at all,” Rodimus admitted. “The energy expenditure must be immense.”

“Ah, we get by,” Blazewing shrugged, a bit evasively. “Come on, let’s scrub up.”

The pools were for soaking, not for washing; Rodimus endured a thorough scrub under a cold spigot, careful of his new paint covering the old, before Blazewing brought him to the lowest pool and left him to soak. Rodimus found himself the recipient of a few odd looks, but for the most part the Seekers were content to pretend he didn’t exist, and Rodimus was content to let them. The cleansing oil was heated to just on the edge of scalding, the heat soaking into his body to soothe aching joints. Rodimus sunk into it practically up to his optics and resolved to stay there until his heat sinks blew.

_Magnus, I’m moving my office to New Vos. I’ll be ruling from the bath from now on._

The Magnus that lived in his head wasn’t at all pleased. _Come on, Galvatron gets to do stuff like that,_ he protested innocently to that frown he could picture all too well.

_If Galvatron jumped off a bridge,_ Imaginary Magnus said flatly, _would you follow him?_

_Dunno. Is he jumping off a bridge into a heated oil bath?_

Rodimus giggled, making the oil around his head ripple. A boisterous gaggle of young Seekers splashed in and out of the pool in front of him, barely noticing the grounder in their midst. “Younglings these days,” he heard someone comment from the pool just overhead.

“Don’t get me started,” grumped the unseen speaker’s companion. “You know there was a rally in Onyx Industrial Park last lunar cycle? To open trade with Iacon, of all things! They were backing up traffic for half the spire!”

“Bah, they just want to get their hands on that incomprehensible Earthen media. It’s all over the place in Iacon. We had proper entertainment in my day.”

“Good old Vosian pole artists.”

“Right.”

“Hmph. ...well, Emirate will never go for it anyway. I heard- ...well.”

“What?”

“...look, you didn’t hear this from me, all right? ...Emirate’s talking about initiating a purge. All Earthen influence out of the spire. Along with anyone who brings it in - it’s exile or the blaster for them.”

Rodimus stiffened. Suddenly, despite the heat of the oil bath, he felt very cold.

“No! ...well, why doesn’t he stop talking about it and do it?”

“Slagged if I know. He’s seemed pretty distracted lately, our Emirate. Keeps wandering off.” 

_Yeah, I’ll just bet._

Rodimus resisted the urge to clamber out of the bath, transform, and barrel like a tank for the nearest exit, staying still and hidden until the two gossiping Seekers left. By then the baths were nearly empty, the dance class having seemingly forgotten about their grounder mascot and left him to make his own way, and Rodimus was grateful for it. He wasn’t sure he could put on the mask of the friendly, goofy Highway just now. He left the baths, the mist swirling in his wake.

As he stepped out into the street, a cold presence joined him, and Rodimus wondered if Starscream just had impeccable timing or the anguish and anger of a Prime just summoned the ghost from the ether.

They entered an alley, the tight space between two facets of the spire too narrow for any Seeker to feel comfortable. “We’re leaving,” Rodimus said aloud, not looking around. “Now.”

Starscream shimmered into view before him. The points of his insubstantial wings brushed the walls. “That would be a mistake, Prime,” he said, his usual mocking lilt gone from his voice.

“I’m putting people in danger just by being here.” Rodimus glared at him. “I overheard - Snowstorm’s going to perform a purge.”

“I know.”

Rodimus’s engine turned over. “You _know?_ Primus, Starscream, when were you going to tell me? Are you _trying_ to get me killed?” The Ultra Magnus that lived in his head gave him a pointed look. “You… aren’t actually trying to get me killed, are you?”

“Oh for - no, you idiot!” Starscream swatted at him - Rodimus felt an icy draft through his shoulder, but nothing more. “All right, it’s the kind of thing I might have done a long time ago, but believe me, I don’t want you dead.” He turned away when Rodimus’s glare didn’t soften, pacing in midair. “I admit I had a bit - just a bit! - of an ulterior motive. I wanted to see what they’d made of Vos, that’s all. I’d had no intention of getting involved and I have no loyalty to the Emirate.”

“You have no loyalty to me either.”

“No.” Starscream settled against the wall, long legs crossing casually. “But I like you more than him.”

Despite his best intentions, that finally broke through Rodimus’s bad mood. He laughed, shaking his head as he leaned against the wall next to Starscream. “So - this is where you’ve been all this time? Finding out about the purge?”

“Sadly, no. The purge was an incidental finding. I was checking on the status of - hmm - call it regalia of Vos. I’d assumed it had been destroyed in the war.” A frown darkened his features. “Well, the good news is, it wasn’t, but that’s about it for good news today.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this from the beginning?”

Starscream gave him a tart look. “Because, _Prime,_ it was none of your business.”

“Right.” Rodimus sighed, canting his head back. “So. Why is it a bad idea to leave Vos before Emirate Snowstorm purges Vos of Earthen influence? Because I’m pretty sure he sees me as a huge source of Earthen influence.”

“Because if you flee, Snowstorm will be more than happy to use it against you. ‘Oh, that wicked Prime, he snuck into Vos to corrupt our youth and then fled like a coward before he could be called to account for it.’” Starscream waved his arms like an actor in a pretentious Golden Age drama. “Something along those lines. I’m afraid he’s got you by the gorget, Rodimus.”

“I don’t slagging care about my reputation!” Rodimus’s drama was entirely unfeigned, by contrast. “I care that the friends I’ve made here are going to be exiled or killed because I decided to revisit an old hobby. ...I never should have come,” he mumbled, one hand to his helm.

Starscream sighed. “What Snowstorm plans to do, Prime, he’ll do whether you are here or not. If you want to help them…”

“Don’t say it.”

Starscream completely ignored him, speaking instead to the universe at large. “Then see to it that Snowstorm is deposed before the purge can take place!”

Rodimus’s vents hissed in exasperation. “Absolutely not.”

“Why not?” Starscream demanded, fists on his hips.

“Like you said.” Rodimus gave him a thin smile. “It’s none of my business.”

“You are _so slagging frustrating.”_ Starscream made throttling-gestures in the air at him. “You are low on options, Rodimus Prime!”

“Do you really want a Vosian Emirate who was installed by the Iaconian Prime, Starscream? You, of all people?”

Starscream scoffed at Rodimus’s glare. “I’m not expecting you to do any _installing._ Just - give a little nudge, that’s all. There’s always people who are convinced they can do the leader’s job better than the current leader.”

“You would know,” Rodimus muttered.

“I wasn’t _wrong.”_ Starscream floated the last small span down to him, one tingly-cold hand on his shoulder. “You’re tired, Rodimus. Tired and upset and in no condition to be making decisions. Let’s go home. You can recharge on it and look at things afresh in the on-cycle. Snowstorm won’t act tonight.”

Rodimus sighed gustily, all his vents yawning open. Starscream was right about at least one thing: he _was_ tired. That Vosian hammock called to him far more strongly than the long trek back to Iacon.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” he growled at the ghost, heading back out of the alley. He heard Starscream’s laugh as he faded out of sight.

***

When Rodimus entered the Airstream studio the next on-cycle, Skyquake was waiting for him.

“Highway.” Skyquake tilted his helm meaningfully, and Rodimus froze before remembering _oh right, that’s me._ “A word?”

“Sure.” He glanced at Sterling, who wasn’t looking any happier than Skyquake was, and his spark sank into his greaves. Had he been found out? He followed Skyquake out into the hall, mentally mapping out his avenues for a quick and inglorious exit.

“I received a message from the Emirate’s office,” Skyquake told him once they were out of audial range of the classroom. “Requesting that you take the center pole for the expo.”

“I-” Rodimus shut his mouth. “Oh.”

Ruby optics pinned him. “Is there something I should know?”

Rodimus winced. “...Yes, but it’s not something I can talk about yet. Skyquake, I promise you, I had no idea he was going to do this. It was my understanding that I would have to _earn_ my place at the expo like everyone else.”

Skyquake didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t say as much. “Sterling told me you’re good enough to dance the expo even without the Emirate’s endorsement.”

Rodimus stared at him blankly. “She did?”

“From a technical standpoint, you’ve gone from rusty to exceptional. It’s just the pole texture that gives you trouble, and we can fix that. Well, that and a certain set of uniquely Iaconian hangups.”

“I’ve been working on that,” Rodimus muttered, hunching his shoulders, and to his relief Skyquake bestowed a grin on him. “Does this mean you’re going to do what the Emirate asks?”

“I’m going to put you in my class,” Skyquake admitted. “I don’t know about the center pole. Sterling was supposed to have that position.”

“Oh, slag, no wonder she looked like she was going to kill me.” Rodimus covered his mouth as Skyquake barked a laugh. “Seriously, no, I’m good but I’m not Sterling levels of good. The Emirate can jump off a bridge.”

“...he can what?”

“Sorry. Grounder idiom. Um - he can fly headfirst into a wall?”

Skyquake laughed again. “Try ‘he can perch on a slagheap.’ And that’s easy for you to say, you get to go home after this.” His vents huffed. “To the smelter with it, it won’t be the first time he’s threatened to cut our funding. Come on, let’s get to work.”

Rodimus winced as Skyquake turned away, biting back an apology. _Snowstorm won’t let me run away. I’m already making trouble for people just being here._

_...what am I saying? If Snowstorm goes through with this purge, it’ll be more than trouble on Skyquake. Him, Sterling, Cloudstreaker and Darkwing, Boomer…_

The Earth-music-loving sound tech’s image floated before him: young and earnest and longing for a trine of her own. That, more than Starscream’s honeyed temptations or the specter of Magnus’s disappointment, was what moved Rodimus to make his choice at last.

_Fine, Snowstorm. You want to see me dance? Let’s slagging dance._


	4. Chapter 4

_”You!?”_

Rodimus struck a pose worthy of Starscream at his most smug, basking in the shocked outrage of Firejewel and Etherjewel. “Hello, boys. I’m back,” he singsonged.

Skyquake knocked him gently in the back of the helm. “No banter, working,” he admonished all three. Rodimus ducked his head sheepishly and took the only free pole in the room, towards the back, stepping over Etherjewel’s attempt to trip him on the way there.

Firejewel was working on Skyquake in the meantime, speaking in an affronted hiss that put Rodimus in mind of Starscream in a snit. “He doesn’t even know the routine! Do you really think he can learn it in nine rotations? Without repulsors?”

Skyquake gave him a stormy frown. “Remember in beginner’s class, where they made you turn your repulsors off to prove you didn’t need them? Or should I send you back there for a refresher course?” Firejewel pinned his wings back in mute denial. “As for the routine, if he can’t learn it in two rotations he wouldn’t have made it through Sterling’s class. Highway!” Skyquake barked. “You know Flamestep’s _Triumph of the Thirteen_ routine?”

Rodimus grinned. “Got it memorized.”

“Good. Perform the third stanza, backwards.”

Rodimus blinked as his mental processes screeched to a halt and reversed direction. Slowly. With flashing lights and beepy noises.

“Well?” Etherjewel sneered.

Rodimus took an in-vent, held it, let it go. “Got it.” He seized the pole and lowered himself down instead of mounting up, until he was seated in a full split. He leaned back, legs kicking up the pole, arching his back as he walked himself up into a handstand - then hooked his ankles around the pole and pushed himself into a spin. Someone started to stomp out a rhythm for him and he picked up the speed of his spin to match it, grinning as he spread his arms. Six beats, then he pulled himself up, swung his legs out wide and let his hips drop, hanging on by powerfully-flexed arms as his body circled the pole.

“You just performed the second stanza in our expo routine,” Skyquake announced, his voice grimly amused. “Barring a couple of minor variations.”

Rodimus spun down the pole to end in another full split, showing off for Skyquake - and, it must be said, for the twins, who were doing some excellent landed-fish impressions for people who’d never seen a fish in their lives. “Seems easy enough. I can’t wait to learn the rest.”

“You will by the end of the on-cycle.” Skyquake gestured him up the pole again; his new classmates followed suit. “Break time’s over, sparklings; time to dance.”

And so they danced, Rodimus following along behind the others, determined not to show a wobble or slowdown. Skyquake, a tougher taskmaster than Sterling for all he had a sense of humor about it, showed Rodimus no mercy, but by the end of the session he had a rough understanding of the routine for the expo. And hand cramps. _All the hand cramps._

“Not bad,” Skyquake told him, as he sprawled on the ground massaging the base of his thumb joint. “We’ll work on your form, but not bad.”

“Let me guess. Tart it up a little more?”

“...huh?”

Rodimus grinned hazily at the ceiling past Skyquake’s head. “Earth idiom. Means make it sexy.”

“Primus, you really did go native on Earth, didn’t you?” Skyquake laughed at him, but it was a kind sound, reminding Rodimus a little of Kup. “Sure, ‘tart it up’. Tart it up a lot. You gotta _make_ ‘em wanna watch you, grab their optics and don’t let ‘em look away. You’re not bad-looking, as grounders go…”

“Thanks, I think.”

“...but you’re just gonna fade into the background if you rely on the moves themselves for visual interest. Here.” He reached down, and Rodimus allowed him to haul him upright. This close, Rodimus realized they were of a height, easily able to look in one another’s optics; Skyquake’s creased as he smirked. “Watch me,” he ordered, and left Rodimus standing to claim the pole he’d been dancing on.

“This is you now,” he announced, and performed a simple mount, bending his knees in a crouch and then pulling up to hang from it by one knee and a hand. “Technically competent, but not very interesting.”

Rodimus huffed, pride stung. Skyquake smirked as he dismounted. “Now. Same mount, more tart. Watch.”

That big frame _wiggled_ as it sank down into a crouch, knees parted and aft swaying to some internal beat. Skyquake surged up hips-first, wrapping his leg around the pole like it was a lover he meant to have his way with, and left the ground with one leg trailing behind him like a veil. Rodimus’s fans kicked on.

“You see?” Skyquake smirked from his perch.

“Uh. Yeah.” Rodimus forced his fans off. “I see the difference, but - how do you make your body _do_ that?”

Skyquake groaned, rubbing between his optics. “Primus. Haven’t you ever been attracted to someone?”

“Sure, a few people.” Rodimus shrugged.

“What did you like about them?”

Rodimus thought back to his various crushes, trying to find a common denominator among them. “Well… their confidence, I suppose,” he mused.

Skyquake’s optics flashed in triumph. “Then _be confident._ Flaunt those legs! Strut! Be the hotaft you want to see.” He glowered at Rodimus’s lost expression. “Look, you can watch our recordings for ideas, but the confidence isn’t something I can teach you. Just trust me - you got nothing to be unconfident about.”

He clasped Rodimus’s shoulder, and Rodimus managed a smile - which faded into uncertainty again as soon as Skyquake turned his back to go talk to the rest of his students. _How am I supposed to be confident? I’m too tall and too heavy in this body. It’s not even mine - just something the Matrix did to me._

_Great, Rodimus. The Emirate is about to enact a violent purge against his own people and you’re worried about not feeling sexy enough._

Scoffing at himself, Rodimus went back to the pole. He tried to copy Skyquake’s motions as he went through the mount again - the aft sway and the hip thrust - but it just didn’t feel natural. He felt like he was play-acting, not dancing.

_Maybe I’m just not built for this._

The Seekers were beginning to drift out of the room, back to quarters or social spaces, whatever they were inclined to do. Some of them were probably headed to the public baths, but that location had kind of lost its shine for Rodimus, and anyway he wasn’t in the mood to relax.

“Skyquake, do you mind if I stay here a little longer?” he called out over his shoulder.

“Sure, knock yourself out.”

“For all the good it’ll do him,” he heard one of the twins mutter. He gritted his denta as his engine growled a warning.

Then he was alone in the studio, facing only his reflection in the mirrors. Under the dull paint even his signature decal had disappeared: the mech in the mirror was a stranger. A tall, bulky warbuild stranger.

_I look like a Decepticon._

Thinking of that made him think of Galvatron; _he’d_ certainly see nothing wrong with a tall bulky warbuild. Rodimus stalked up and down the studio, trying to capture Galvatron’s arrogant stride, the way he moved when he had something he wanted in his grasp. Galvatron gave way to Cyclonus, his calm self-assurance; from him to Springer with the world at his pedes, and Arcee with her boundless energy. Arcee would have taken a few spins on the pole, just for the hell of it, so Rodimus did the same, pulling himself idly around and around by one arm.

As he straightened, a shadow crossed him as a Seeker trine flew by outside, and for a moment he saw Optimus Prime in the mirror.

Optimus Prime, Rodimus felt sure, had never danced on the pole. He’d been expressive with his body in other ways, though. Rodimus shuttered his optics and tasted Earthen sunshine and dust at the Autobots’ basketball court and one of countless impromptu games. Optimus shone in Rodimus’s memory, laughing as he showed off his skill and prowess, teasing his playmates into coming after him, almost taunting. Rodimus felt his weight shift against the pole, a smile beginning to touch his mouth. _Come on, come on,_ he said internally in his elder Prime’s voice. _Can you keep up with me? Let’s see you try._

He lifted himself up the pole, legs parting to flash unpainted inner thighs just briefly. Knees clasped the pole between them and Rodimus let himself fall upside down, fingertips brushing the floor. Galvatron’s brash arrogance took over and he let his arms take his weight and kicked off from the pole, flipping over and into a full split. He arched, thinking of Cyclonus’s focus and pride; a quick backwards roll found him slinking over the floor, Springer in a playful mood. He arched up again, lifting his upper body off the floor with Arcee’s sharp grace, but the playful wriggle he followed it with was all his own.

Struck with inspiration, he pinged a music file to the player in the corner. It lit up immediately in response, pumping out the opening bars of a song he and Blaster and Jazz had danced to on Earth, back when he was Hot Rod - with more enthusiasm than skill, as he recalled with a grin. Its rhythm throbbed, seizing his body and _making_ it move, something no Cybertronian music he’d yet heard had the power to do. Blissfully, he surrendered to it, and danced.

_Shake it like an earthquake, move your tail,_ chanted the human singer, and Rodimus performed Skyquake’s “same mount, more tart” along with the chant. This time he _felt_ it, running through him like the pole itself was electrified. There was fierce joy, and pride, and an exhilaration that made him think _this is what it feels like to be a Seeker in flight._

He was hot as hell. Who wouldn’t want to watch him dance?

Rodimus got a round of applause as the song ended and he spiraled down the pole; he was riding so high on elevated charge and rapture that he didn’t even startle. He took a bow, laughing, and waved sheepishly at the beginners’ class filing in for their dance session. “Sorry, I’ll get out of your way,” he told them, and got a collection of grins and friendly scoffs in return.

“That was amazing.” A smaller Seeker with blue optics - _that,_ at last, startled Rodimus - gripped his hand. “I’ve never seen a grounder move like that! Are you going to be in the expo? With that music? I mean, I assumed it’s Earth music, that was a human voice, right? I didn’t know human voices did that either!”

Rodimus found himself laughing, fond of the chattery youngling already - a glance around the class proved he wasn’t the only one. “Is that something you’d like to see? A grounder dancing to Earth music at the Vosian Expo?”

The Seeker’s optics burned with excitement. “Yes! Yes.”

Rodimus smiled. “Then I’ll see what I can do.”

He gave his admirer’s hand a squeeze and left the beginners to their lesson. As he left, the teacher - a slim model with prominent Decepticon symbols on his wings - gave him a casual nod.

In the empty hallway he encountered a cold tingle on his spoiler and a laugh in his audial. “Another adorable friend, Prime? I take it this means you’re sticking around a bit longer. I knew you’d come around.”

Rodimus smiled at the empty air. “Hey, Starscream, I’m going to invent a new routine. It’ll be called The Fuck-You Dance and I’m going to perform it in the mausoleum where they put what was left of you. It’ll be the best dance of my career.”

“No need to get snippy,” Starscream remarked, but there was a grin in his voice - now that he was getting exactly what he wanted, he was remarkably resilient to insults. “I’m still your best advisor.”

“Advise this.” Rodimus stuck both middle fingers in the air. “Little bit of Earth culture for you there. It means go fuck yourself.”

“I was on Earth longer than you, I _know_ what it means.” Starscream huffed and Rodimus grinned - his ghostly advisor was annoyed. Equilibrium was restored to their relationship.

“So,” he said, swinging his fatigued arms to get the feeling back. “Absent a giant planet-eating monster, how does one go about toppling an evil regime?”

***

Starscream, as it turned out, had been doing a _lot_ of eavesdropping since coming to New Vos. Rodimus probably should have greeted that revelation with more suspicion, but it seemed rude to wonder what dirty little secrets Starscream had collected at Autobot HQ when he was reaping the benefits of the ghost’s intelligence gathering.

“There are six or so factions operating just under the surface,” Starscream murmured in his audial as Rodimus wandered what city streets he could reach without assistance. “They’re constantly forming and breaking alliances, but they’re united in their dislike for the current regime.”

“I thought Snowstorm was popular,” Rodimus mused, his vocalizer locked to whisper-level. “Didn’t he become Emirate through democratic process?”

“With our only model for democracy being Earth, it’s no wonder it’s still a bit of a work in progress on Cybertron,” Starscream answered snidely. “Snowstorm won with a plurality of votes, not a majority. There were several candidates - oh, and you’ll never guess who was one of his rivals.”

“Soundwave?” Rodimus asked innocently, and got a ghostly kick in the aft in response.

“Darkwing!” Starscream declared. “I checked the voting records, and it’s likely he would have won in a runoff election, if they’d bothered to have one. But the interim government was full of Separatists, so the voting just ended there. Darkwing’s been keeping his nosecone clean ever since, but his supporters are in a war of whispers with Snowstorm’s spies.”

“Are they the reason I was allowed in Iacon?”

“No, they were more surprised than anyone. It’s looking more and more like Snowstorm seized advantage of your interest in dance to lead you into a public pillorying.” Rodimus shivered, the image chilling him more than Starscream’s presence. “Nobody among the anti-Separatists have rumbled your true identity yet, as far as I can tell. They just think you’re a clueless stooge.”

Rodimus grimaced. “Well, they aren’t wrong.”

“None of that.” Starscream tapped his helm. “You’re a stooge with _me_ on your side.”

_“You_ were the one who suggested this trip, as I recall.” Rodimus sighed as he reached another dead end that would have been just a brief repulsor-jump for a Seeker. “So, what do I do about it? ‘Hey, Darkwing, guess what...’? Or is that too gauche, you know, this whole ‘just say what’s on your processor’ business?”

“It’s that attitude that gives Ultra Magnus an optic twitch every time you go on a diplomatic mission, you know.”

“Knowing that you’re worried about his health will warm Magnus’s fuel pump,” Rodimus said dryly, and laughed when Starscream kicked at him again. “Okay, okay. Channelling my inner Jazz here. We can’t just take him out-”

“Pity.”

“So we have to turn public opinion against him. We know he’s going to institute a purge, if we disseminated that information then the people who would be targets would at least have forewarning to defend themselves, and people on the fence might be tipped to the anti-Separatists rather than intimidated into silence.”

“But we have no proof. If you run around spreading rumors you’ll be mocked at best, silenced yourself at worst.”

“Can you get proof?” Rodimus tilted his head up to where he thought Starscream was.

Starscream’s scoff came from the opposite direction. _”Find_ it, maybe. Bring it back to you, or transmit it? Trickier. Unless I could possess Snowstorm-”

“No.”

“Fine, make it harder for yourself.” Starscream huffed.

“Starscream, Snowstorm doesn’t know you’re here. Or that you can possess people. I want to keep it that way.” Rodimus rubbed his chin, his optics dim in thought. “I hate to say it, but this might call for a stealth mission.”

“Oh, Primus.” The opticroll was audible.

“You don’t have to rub my nose in the fact that stealth’s not my best skill.” Rodimus huffed, crossing his arms. “I’m not the one this plan hinges on.”

“You don’t mean-”

Rodimus grinned. “Who’s a better scout than a ghost?” Starscream groaned again. “You’ve already been in and out of the Command Tower. You can get in, find me a route, learn the guards’ patrol schedules, whatever. Sneak me in tonight and we’ll get what we need.”

“And what will you be doing while I’m rolling out the red carpet for you, Rodimus?”

Rodimus turned his optics back to the city, smiling faintly. “I think I’m going to take a bath.”

***

The Vosian bathhouse was much as Rodimus had left it; he got the impression that it never really changed. Rodimus threaded his way through the crowds going in and out and peered up at the tiered waterfalls. _I heard about the purge just sitting in the lowest tier,_ he thought. _Would I hear more if I were able to get up to a higher one? Or would I be too visible there?_ From this distance, the Seekers relaxing in the baths looked like shadows in the mist, their diversity of color and form - which Rodimus was only beginning to learn to read - obscured. They looked relaxed, lounging in luxury Rodimus had never known. Was this what it had been like in Old Vos, before the war?

_Did all the cities have things like this before the war? How much context am I missing, just by being so young?_

He’d just about made up his mind to use the bottom pool again when someone nudged his arm from behind. “Hey! I’ve been calling your name. You’re really zoned out, aren’t you?”

“Darkwing?” Guiltily, Rodimus reviewed his ambient-noise pickups and realized Darkwing had been calling his assumed name. _Some secret agent I am._ “Sorry. I guess I’m a little tired.”

“I’d be worried if you weren’t. I hear you’ve been tearing it up in Skyquake’s class.” Darkwing offered another nudge and a grin. “Way to show ‘em, grounder. I bet the twins are eating their flaps right now.”

“I wouldn’t go that far… but they sure weren’t happy when I learned the routine in the space of one class.”

“That’s what I like to hear.” Darkwing chuckled. “Come join me for a soak? I’ll give you a lift up to my usual pool.”

“Thanks, I’ll take you up on that.”

Darkwing had clearly been taking ‘how to carry grounders’ lessons since their first meeting: rather than hauling Rodimus up by his arms, he allowed Rodimus to sling an arm over his shoulders and stand on his pedes for the flight to the uppermost tier of pools. “Used to be these were reserved for the Emirate and whoever was sucking up to him that cycle,” Darkwing informed him as they settled in. “Now it’s first come, first served, but I like to pretend I’m a bigwing up here anyway.” He stretched out theatrically, resting his arms on the edge of the tub.

“So these actually did survive the war?” Rodimus asked, copying his host’s pose.

“Ehhh…” Darkwing waggled his hand in the air like an uncertain flier. “Mostly. They had to rebuild some of it and replace the plumbing. To be honest it probably runs more efficiently now than it ever did during the Golden Age. We can’t afford to be wasteful anymore.”

His indulging-in-luxury mask had slipped, revealing a pensive frown beneath. Rodimus felt himself go still. “Yeah,” he said carefully, “I know the feeling.”

A crimson glance. “Iacon’s probably doing pretty well for itself these days, isn’t it?”

“Compared to before? Yes, absolutely,” Rodimus admitted. “But there’s still a lot of problems and not as much energon and work to go around as there needs to be.” He waved a hand to take in the baths. “It’ll be a while before we’re capable of building anything to rival this. If it wasn’t for the trade agreements with Earth…”

“...right, ‘cause of that Prime of yours,” Darkwing waggled a finger in the air.

Rodimus fought off a wince, contented himself with a shrug. “I don’t know the details. I just know that if it wasn’t for the Earthen materials coming in I wouldn’t have any work at all.” He was actually quoting Hoist, almost without thinking, but it slotted seamlessly into his cover identity.

“You ever see humans in Iacon?”

“Sure. Earth’s ambassador and his - cohort? Sort of?” The English word _family_ danced on the back of his glossa; he swallowed it with some effort. “They’re around sometimes. They talk to people.” He chuckled. “Hell, sometimes the ambassador’s life partner heads down to the ‘Con section of the city to talk shop. That one’s fearless, I swear.”

“Is that right?” Darkwing chuckled, his optics dimming. “Well, isn’t that something.”

Rodimus leaned forward, the warmth of the cleanser soaking into his shoulders. “Why do you ask?”

“Curiosity, I guess.” Darkwing shrugged. “I guess you’ve figured out already I have a passing interest in Earth culture.”

Rodimus chuckled. “Sure.”

“It’s not terribly uncommon, but our charming Emirate likes to talk about humans being useless bags of protoplasm dragging Iacon down with their strange, uh…” Darkwing waved his hand. “Organic ways of organicness. Or something. So I’ve never met a human in the metal.”

“So to speak.”

“You know what I mean.” Darkwing huffed. “One day I’d like to meet that ambassador-cohort. Invite ‘em to visit Vos. Think they’d go for it?”

“If the political climate changes,” Rodimus said carefully, “I don’t see why not.”

Darkwing grinned. “That’s the thing about political climates. They’re _always_ subject to change.”

***

So, that had gone… pretty well. Rodimus was fairly sure.

Without coming out and saying anything explicitly, Darkwing had hinted at a community of like-minded mechs who might want to meet Iacon’s visiting pole dancer and discuss things the current ruling class would prefer they not discuss. And without committing himself to anything, Rodimus had communicated his willingness to meet said community. It had taken hours, but they had been hours spent in a tub of hot cleanser fluid, which made that diplomatic dancing-around Rodimus usually hated into something far more bearable.

Rodimus swayed himself idly in his hammock, clean and comfortable from the soak and with his evening’s fuel warm in his tank. Living as a dancer was far more relaxing than living as a Prime. Even the oncoming trainwreck that was Snowstorm was easier to deal with than the hundred little disasters in the making that was managing Iacon. And hey, he had a plan. Infiltrate the Council spire, find something damning, discredit the slag out of Snowstorm, and get him run out of town on a rail - or at least sufficiently de-powered - just in time to kick aft at the dance expo. Compared to killing Unicron, it was easy.

In theory.

No power in the universe was going to stop him dozing off before Starscream returned, so Rodimus didn’t fight it, getting comfortable and drifting into recharge. He dreamed disjointedly, images slipping in and out of his mind like notes of a half-remembered song, and awoke to Starscream perched in the air above him.

“Hey,” he murmured, stretching in the hammock.

“Hey yourself,” was the reply. “If you’ve got an alibi in mind, now’s the time to put in place. I need you at the Command Tower in two joors.”

“Got me on a tight schedule, don’t you?” Rodimus complained, sliding out of the hammock to the floor.

“Well, I didn’t want to interrupt your beauty rest. ...Primus knows you need it.”

Rodimus rolled his optics. “Go get yourself some fresh insults, that one expired when Megatron was still young and idealistic.” Starscream huffed. “All right, I’m coming. ...ugh, the Command Tower. Getting there’s gonna be a pain in the aft.”

“Nonsense. I have a route all planned for you.” Starscream settled in the air next to him, preening. “Not the easiest route, perhaps, but perfectly traversable for a suitably agile grounder. Aren’t I thoughtful, Prime?”

“Yes, that’s exactly the word I would use to describe you.” Rodimus stretched until his servos sang with strain, performed a spin that would have looked more natural performed by a ballet dancer than a warbuild. Starscream watched approvingly as Rodimus demonstrated the agility and precision of his steps. “Well? Are we going?” he asked, some of his old, foolish brashness returning to him in a warm, fizzy rush.

Starscream inclined his helm, something in his grin echoing Rodimus’s own. “I’m ready when you are.”


	5. Chapter 5

“I hate you.”

“Many do.”

“Seriously, I hate your face.”

“Could you hate it a little more quickly? I really do need you in place soon.”

Rodimus growled and kept climbing. The twin set of energy conduits hummed under his hands as he pulled himself along, up and up and _slagging UP_ toward the pinnacle of the spire where the Command Tower stood. This after the sneaking around half of Bridgeway, scrambling up drainage pipes and in one memorable instance nearly slipping and falling off the broadcast tower. He wasn’t quite foolish enough to think the mission ahead of him would be _easier,_ exactly, but it would probably be less physically taxing.

“What’s the big hurry anyway?” he demanded. “Guard changes are like waiting for a transport. If you miss one, the next one will be along eventually.”

“Trust me, Rodimus, there’s only one point tonight we can baffle the guard without raising any red flags. If we miss it tonight, we’ll have to wait until tomorrow, and you just don’t have that much time.”

Rodimus glared up at the tower ahead. Typically, it was near the pinnacle of the spire, rising into the dark and starry sky overhead, both declaration and threat. The Command Tower reminded him of nothing so much as Darkmount, sleek and menacing, dominating the sky overhead and humming faintly with power. Rodimus had been to Darkmount three times: once as an attacker, once as a captive, and once as the victorious Prime following the destruction of Unicron. Rodimus fixed his goal in his targeting display, letting its silent challenge power him through handhold after handhold, and tried not to think too much about the connections between Old Vos and the Decepticons.

He reached the upper ledged and paused there, regaining his balance. Starscream hovered above him, but for once he wasn’t snarking or exhorting the Prime to hurry up. He had his attention to the west, where Rodimus could see the dim light of a guard station.

“That’s our target?” he asked, drifting back against the wall where he couldn’t be seen.

“It is,” Starscream confirmed. “And it looks like we’re right on time.”

He faded from sight. Rodimus saw the ripples of his activity, though, in the sudden uncomprehending shiver of the guardsmech just approaching the station, an expectant silence - and suddenly the lights in the guard station went out. The guardsmech, his hand lifting to touch the door panel, jerked back and swore. “Slaggit, not again!”

He had to pry the door open, grumbling his frustration, and when he finally got it open he swore again. “Redline, how many times I gotta tell you,” he demanded, striding into the little guard cubicle. “Stop playing games on shift!”

“It wasn’t me this time, it just shorted out!” Rodimus heard the other mech protest just before the door swifted shut. Rodimus dashed past it and through the frozen-open door into the tower just before the guard station lit up again.

“Wow,” he gasped. “You weren’t kidding about the timing.”

“Remember that next time you doubt me,” Starscream whispered in his audial, but he sounded amused. “Now come along. Incriminating evidence doesn’t just find itself.”

The Command Tower was less open and airy than what Rodimus had come to expect of Vosian architecture: despite its high ceilings, its maze of close hallways reminded him more of the Ark and Autobot City - or, again, of Darkmount. Rodimus slid cautiously down the hallway after Starscream, passive scanners boosted to their limit. They’d be looking for a data storage room or similar, but although Rodimus knew where he’d put such a thing - not in the top of a tower, for starters - Seekers thought differently about what constituted ‘secure.’ He had no choice but to follow Starscream, and trust both that he knew where he was going and that he wasn’t leading Rodimus straight into a trap.

It did occur to Rodimus that he was pinning a lot of hope on what historically had been a very flimsy structure indeed. But from what he knew about what Starscream wanted, he figured that Starscream had more to lose than he did if he was caught or betrayed.

Hallway after hallway, pausing every time his sensors brought news of movement or transmission. He could feel Starscream’s impatience prickling at him, a sensation that didn’t quite make it to his analytical center but shivered on the edge of his sensornet, but stealth, never his strong suit when he’d been small, had only become more difficult after his reformat. _Wish Jazz was here,_ he thought, then dismissed the notion. _Jazz wouldn’t thank me for dumping my problems on him._

_I caused this mess. Time to clean it up._

“In here,” Starscream hissed, and Rodimus scanned the room from the entrance. The place seethed with electrical activity, but no living metal. He stepped inside, sliding the door closed behind him.

It was a server room: every wall was lined with black towers, red indicator lights staring and blinking like accusing optics. Rodimus glanced around for a control console, but couldn’t find one. “Now I really do wish Jazz was here,” he muttered.

“Oh, please. What would Jazz do, blow it up?” Starscream rolled his optics. “Leave the hacking to me. It’s time I became the ghost in _this_ machine.” He sank into the nearest server tower before Rodimus could call him on the pun; a moment later the tower’s lights started flickering wildly.

Rodimus quickly pulled out his data block and plugged it in. The Autobot symbol on the top lit up, glowing green, then blue to indicate data was being transferred. Rodimus tapped the symbol and squinted at the projected display.

“...holy ball bearings,” he muttered. “Starscream, is this what you were looking for?”

“I just wanted to see if it was still intact!” Starscream’s voice took on a strident note - _defensive,_ Rodimus thought. “And I was hoping Snowstorm hadn’t gotten his hands on it. He shouldn’t have even known about it, but these sorts of things never stay hidden forever.”

“What sorts of things?”

“Power,” Starscream answered flatly, and Rodimus sensed that now would be a bad time to ask further. “I’m almost done. This should be more than enough evidence to boot your little friend-cadre into action.”

“What kind of action are you hoping for?” Silence. _“Starscream._ We’re not trying to incite violent rebellion here, what do you think is going to happen?”

“It hardly matters, to me _or_ to you.” Starscream’s voice was tart. “This is still a Vosian matter, and Vosians shall handle it as they see fit.”

“I know, I know.” Rodimus ran a hand over his helm. “I’m still going to feel responsible if this turns to slag.”

“You’d feel responsible no matter what.” There was an odd, almost-soft note hiding in Starscream’s abrasive tone, one that Rodimus tried not to interpret as fondness. “It’s the Prime in you.”

Rodimus rubbed a hand over his face, feeling the creases in his cheeks - growth lines, Kup had called them, leftover scars from the Matrix working its will on Hot Rod’s form. Worry lines, Arcee teased sometimes, when he was feeling the weight of the galaxy on his shoulders. Yes, of course he felt responsible for everything. It was the price he paid for wielding more power than anyone else.

Save, perhaps, for Snowstorm, and thinking of him made Rodimus impatient to leave. “How much longer?” he asked.

“These servers are nine million years old,” Starscream snapped, “and haven’t been maintained sufficiently in all that time. There’s been this war you may have heard of.”

“There’s going to be this purge you may have heard of,” Rodimus shot back. “An Emirate who’d turn a weapon on his own people won’t hesitate to shoot me.”

_“On the contrary, Prime, you’re far more valuable to me alive.”_

Rodimus yelped, wrist blasters charging as he turned to track the speaker - who was nowhere to be seen. _”An intercom,”_ Starscream hissed, too low to be picked up by anyone but Rodimus, and the lights on the server he was possessing went dark.

“Snowstorm,” Rodimus called. “Why don’t you come down here so we can chat like reasonable mechanisms?”

_”I’m not quite that stupid, Prime. For example, I know you’re here, Starscream.”_

“Oh, well done,” Starscream didn’t make himself visible, but his sneer was audible enough in his voice that he didn’t need to. “That’s a puzzle any simple calculation drone could have put together.”

“Way to confirm his guess,” Rodimus hissed.

_”It wasn’t a guess. You’d never have convinced him to stay behind. I remember when the mech was Emirate, you know,”_ Snowstorm, too, was capable of an audible sneer. _”Always poking in where you weren’t wanted. Always so jealous of anyone with a scrap of power who wasn’t you. Believe me, it came as no surprise at all when you abandoned Vos to follow Megatron.”_

_“Abandoned!?”_ Starscream did go visible then, lighting up with fury. “I was acting in Vos’s interest! You’d prefer I allied with the Senate?”

_”Gentlemechs,”_ Rodimus shouted, and mercifully both Seekers fell silent to let him speak. “You’re a few million years too late to be having this argument. Snowstorm,” he continued firmly, turning away from Starscream and facing the far wall for lack of any better direction to address. “I’m going to give you a chance to back away from the abyss here. Tell me you’re not planning what I think you’re planning.”

Snowstorm sighed theatrically over the comm. _”Power down your weapons systems and surrender, Rodimus Prime. I’m going to have a good long recharge, and then I’m going to have to waste time I_ could _have spent planning the details of my ascendence on figuring out what to do with you.”_

“You wouldn’t kill me,” Rodimus challenged. “My Autobots know where I’ve gone.” Well, Arcee knew. That would have to be enough.

_”I don’t have to.”_ The door opened, and a figure stepped into view at the entrance: a Seeker, arm blasters lifted. The flicker of transmission traffic revealed he wasn’t alone. _”My guards are armed with stun blasters. You can walk to our detention facility or be dragged, your choice.”_

Rodimus swore and lowered his arms, making Starscream sputter. “Prime! You can’t be serious!”

“I did _not_ ,” Rodimus gritted, “come here to restart the war, Starscream.”

_”I thought you might say that.”_

Rodimus growled his engine as the guards entered, wrestled his unresisting arms behind him and cuffed them there, and herded him away with the guidance of blows and barked orders in the manner of practically every prison guard in the galaxy. He resisted just long enough to hear Snowstorm’s parting shot.

_”Oh - and Starscream? If you even think of getting in my way, I’ll tell Iacon that you betrayed the Prime to me. Good luck getting whatever it is you want badly enough to cooperate with Autobots after that.”_

“I’m going to enjoy watching you get pilloried,” Starscream hissed, and then Rodimus was too far away to hear any more.

***

Rodimus felt sure Snowstorm meant to bore him to death.

His cell was small enough to give even the most even-keeled flier claustrophobia, a hard bench serving him for a berth only if he bent his legs, and he spent a while lying on it counting all the ways this mission had gone horribly, horribly wrong, and how badly he had let Iacon and the Autobots down, and how much groveling he was going to have to do to Ultra Magnus. Then he went over every inch of his cell looking for the slightest weakness he could use to escape. Finding none, he cherished a few unworthy-of-his-station fantasies of what he was going to do to Snowstorm if he got the chance; then he tried to nap, only to give up in frustration hours later. Then he spent a while pretending to be Princess Leia, trapped aboard the Death Star but without losing an ounce of her defiance, but even though Snowstorm made a great Grand Moff Tarkin in Rodimus’s imagination (and what the hell was a Moff, anyway? It just sounded weird. Moff. Moff moff moff. ...heh.), he doubted very much he had a secret twin brother coming to his rescue, and Starscream-

...oh no. Starscream was not allowed to be the Han to his Leia. That would not end well for anybody.

Rodimus groaned and pulled an arm over his optics. Being in the clink was starting to play tricks on his processor. He had to escape before he completely cracked. He rolled to his pedes again, determined to test every surface in the cell again, but his thumping and scraping brought no progress and he was just about ready to give up again when a blast of cold flooded his cell.

“So here you are!” Starscream exclaimed.

“Starscream?” Rodimus blurted, but the ghost was gone again, leaving him blinking.

Moments later the door opened, revealing Starscream hovering impatiently over a silver-brushed Seeker with pink-striped wings. “Comet?” Rodimus demanded. “What are you doing here?”

Comet’s dreamy look turned to him, and Rodimus was surprised to see a laser-like focus behind it. “In Vos we call it a jailbreak.”

Rodimus stared. And managed with heroic effort to refrain from asking if Comet wasn’t a little short for a stormtrooper.

***

The cell block seemed to go on forever, but Comet’s sense of direction was unerring. He led grounder and ghost down into the heart of the tower, where it connected to the rest of the spire, via little-used servant corridors and abandoned conference suites. “You know this place well,” Rodimus observed.

“I ought to,” Comet answered offhandedly. “I was built here. Snowstorm is my co-creator.”

“...wait, what?”

“This way.” Comet pressed his palm to the wall, and what had looked like another section of decking slid away in pieces to reveal a long shaft. He stepped into the void and disappeared, as calm as if he were stepping into a warm oil bath.

Rodimus and Starscream glanced at each other. “There’s something not quite right about that one,” Starscream muttered.

“Never mind that, help me find a ladder or something.”

Rodimus sat down and slung a leg over the side, feeling in the darkness for a ledge. Comet popped up into view again, mystified until he saw how the grounder was struggling. “You really need antigravs,” he observed.

“When my life’s not in danger anymore, I’ll see about investing in a set.” Rodimus grunted as his pede slipped again. “I don’t suppose you have a gravsled on you. Maybe a shuttle?”

“Sorry, no.” The sound of rising antigravs echoed up the shaft. “I’ve got some friends though.”

“Great,” Rodimus groaned, seeing two trines of war-model Seekers emerging from the darkness. “My favorite way to travel.”

***

The Seekers brought him out of Bridgeway entirely, to the skeletal remains of Farsight, the spire that had housed Vos’s academies, laboratories and communications centers. He worried that even this measure wouldn’t be enough to throw Snowstorm off the trail, stolen straight from under the Emirate’s nose as he’d been, but the dull blue Seeker who’d introduced hirself as Static Ghost assured him that ei had a Sigma power that rendered their whole group invisible to radar. “Good enough for me,” Rodimus had said, after a moment’s confused blinking, and Static Ghost laughed.

Comet lingered after the rest of them had flown off. “Do you need anything, Highway?” he asked. “I can bring some energon later, but if Snowstorm hurt you, I can get a medic.”

“Snowstorm didn’t lay a hand on me,” Rodimus answered breezily. “Why did you help me, anyway? Against your creator?”

Comet tipped his head to one side, appearing to actually think about the question. “Because Starscream asked for my help. ...I don’t like him very much,” he admitted. “Snowstorm, I mean.”

“I’m sorry.” Rodimus sighed. “Look, when you go back, tell Darkwing, or whoever he’s allied with, that I have something important to tell them. And you should probably tell them my real name.”

“Your real name?”

Rodimus straightened, took a steadying in-vent. “My name is Rodimus Prime.”

***

“Why did you ask Comet for help?”

“He was available. I already knew he was one of Snowstorm’s creations, so he knew his way around the tower, _and_ that he was a member of Darkwing’s little club.” Starscream huffed as Rodimus shot him a sharp look at that. “Another of my incidental findings. And he likes you, so I thought there was a reasonable chance of him agreeing. Why did you tell him your real name?”

Rodimus rested his helm on his folded arms. “Because I’m tired of secrets, Starscream. I only wanted to dance.” Starscream was outside his field of vision, but he could feel the Seeker’s disapproval radiating from him. “Look, I screwed up badly, okay? Putting things right starts with telling the truth.”

“And then what?” Starscream demanded. “You return to Iacon in disgrace and spend the next few vorn moping? While Vos proceeds to blame you for all its troubles? I told you Snowstorm was going to use this against you. You never listen.”

“I listen to you most of the time,” Rodimus offered, and that brought Starscream up short.

“Oh. Well. ...As you should.”

“I just don’t always take your advice.”

“Don’t I know it.” But the snideness had gone out of Starscream’s voice, and Rodimus grinned. “Well, there’s still a chance Snowstorm will be deposed before the expo. Then you’ll get to dance to your spark’s content.”

“I’m not counting on that, but it’d be nice if someone could smuggle me a Vosian dancer’s pole before they sneak me out.” Rodimus gazed out over the ruins of Old Vos, trying to picture in his head what it would have looked like before the war had done its brutal work on it. Whole and shining and full of fliers, buzzing with art and industry, its spires soaring even higher than Bridgeway did… there was a reason that Vos had once been referred to as Primus’s Crown. Rodimus could see it in the shadows of the skeletal remains of the towers that still stood, each dead spire cloaked in memories like heavy mourning capes. Iacon had been dark and starving when it came into Rodimus’s care, with a crumbling infrastructure and no workforce in place aside from Shockwave’s mindless drones, but it had been largely intact. Vos had suffered more damage than any city on Cybertron except Praxus.

“Starscream?” he asked. “Snowstorm said he remembered you as Emirate. Do you know him?”

“I can’t recall,” Starscream admitted. “If I had access to my archived memories, but - well. If I archived his existence, he can’t have been very important. I remember my counselors and eirie-mates.”

Rodimus wanted to object to Starscream’s definition of ‘important,’ but he’d never be eloquent enough to change the very foundations of Starscream’s thinking, and he was in no mood to bang his helm against that particular wall. “Well,” he said instead, “he’s ‘important’ now. No love lost for the Decepticons, any more than the Autobots, but he’s got a Decepticon-like attitude towards Earth.”

“Don’t mistake disdain for isolationism. We were _keenly_ interested in Earth, Rodimus - just not its inhabitants.”

“Yeah, okay, point.” Rodimus smiled. “But isolationism’s only sustainable if you’ve got all the resources you need. Knowing what he’s about to do, I’ll bet Vos is coming to the point where their only choices are conquer or trade.”

Starscream snorted. “Even _with_ this plundered weapon of his, he has no chance of conquest. No army, no spare energy, no means of targeting Iacon directly? He’ll flail around and cause damage, then go down in ignominious defeat. Not even Megatron was so foolish, and _he_ built that ridiculous purple quadruped thing-”

“-wait, you mean Jazz wasn’t just having me on about that?”

“Jazz doesn’t know the _half_ of it,” Starscream said tartly, then reconsidered. “Well, he _was_ a fair spy,” he admitted, uncharacteristically even-handed with the subject under discussion well out of audial range. “Maybe he knows two thirds of it.”

Rodimus laughed, leaning back on his hands. “One day, Starscream, I hope you write your memoirs. I’ll be first in line for a copy.”

“Well.” Starscream preened a bit. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

***

Comet was as good as his word: he brought energon, a repair kit that Rodimus didn’t need but appreciated anyway, and a half-wing of anti-Seperatists, including Darkwing and Cloudstreaker. “Does Skyquake know he’s harboring seditious elements?” he grinned when he saw them.

“We’re artists,” Darkwing shrugged, a ripple of amusement flowing through his followers. “If we’re not seditious we’re not doing it right. And you’re a fine one to talk anyway, Rodimus Prime.” Rodimus chuckled and nodded acknowledgement, changing his identifier beacon briefly back to his true identity before hiding it behind the false one again. “I could’ve lived without you bringing Starscream into our city.”

Rodimus started to apologize, but Starscream spoke over him before the first word had quite formed in his mouth. “If he hadn’t, all of you would have remained ignorant of Snowstorm’s machinations until you found yourselves on the wrong end of a blaster. You ought to be grateful I’m still concerned for my home city.” Weapons systems powered up, vibrating the air. “I’m dead already, you fools, don’t waste your energy.”

“Don’t you dare pretend concern for Vos!” one of Darkwing’s associates snapped. “You abandoned us for Megatron!”

_“I did not!”_ Starscream snapped up in fury. “I joined the Decepticons for Vos’s sake!”

“You liar, you sold us out for your own advancement-”

_Well, this is getting off to a great start._

“Starscream did a lot of slag to a lot of people.” Rodimus raised his voice over them all, using a kind of calm, even-toned bellow that he’d learned from Ultra Magnus. To his own shock, it worked: he had the Seekers’ full attention, a constellation of angry red with the occasional points of gold or violet. “The Autobots too have a legitimate claim to justice from him, but Galvatron took from all of us any chance of seeing that when he executed him. We’ve had to settle for rebuilding what he helped break.” Starscream was huffing like an angry train behind him, but Rodimus wouldn’t look his way. Nothing he was saying was wrong. He’d make it up to the ghost later. “I’m telling you this now because I need you to take what I’m about to say seriously. Once I’ve told you everything, you can decide whether it was worth it to have Starscream haunting your city for a few rotations.”

Darkwing’s glare turned to him. “This better be good, Rodimus Prime.”

“It really, really isn’t.” Yet something eased in Rodimus’s spark, hearing his real name again. “Does the name ‘Virtuoso-5’ mean anything to you?”

Instantly the anger was replaced with concern, Darkwing exchanging glances with his team. “It was an AI that controlled Vos’s utility networks and automated defenses,” he said. “It was supposed to have been destroyed in the bombardments.”

“Well, it saved a copy of itself in the vaults below Vos,” Rodimus pressed on grimly. “And now it’s in the hands of Snowstorm - and he’s going to turn it on the art district.”

Wings splayed and stiffened, shock as easy to read in the Vosians’ body language as text on a screen. “You’re sure of this?”

“I saw the documentation on his efforts to repair the AI in his own files,” Rodimus responded. “He was focusing on the weapons systems surrounding Zeta Tau Platform, which is the site of the expo if I’m not mistaken…” Darkwing nodded faintly in acknowledgement. “If Snowstorm hadn’t caught us in the act I would have a copy to show you.”

“No, I believe you. Just - slag.” Darkwing shook his head. “I respected him. I can’t believe he’d go this far.”

“Maybe he isn’t.” Cloudstreaker laid a hand on Darkwing’s arm. “No disrespect, Prime, but you could be mistaken about Snowstorm’s motivations. He spoke so often of preserving Vos - maybe he’s rebuilding Virtuoso-5 as a piece of our history.”

“Grasping at straws,” Starscream muttered. Cloudstreaker glared at him, vents hissing.

“I overheard a conversation in the baths about an upcoming purge of Earthen influences - and Earth-influenced people,” Rodimus said before Starscream could respond. “And the focus on weapons makes it pretty clear what his target is. I don’t think I’m wrong.” He shrugged regretfully. “Believe me, I’d love to be.”

“Fine.” Darkwing rubbed a hand over his helm, looking so exhausted and resentful of having to deal with this nonsense that Rodimus felt a sudden surge of sympathy for him. “What do you suggest?”

“Me?”

Darkwing waved a hand at Rodimus’s incredulous expression. “You’re the experienced warbuild here. The rest of us were Neutrals or cannon fodder under Shockwave.”

“Yeah, we’re dancers,” added another over Cloudstreaker’s wing. “What do we know about fighting?”

“Speak for yourself, I’m pretty good in a dogfight,” grinned a third, and two others - presumably hir trinemates - swatted hir upside the helm in near unison. “Hey!”

Rodimus laughed. “Well, if we play our credits right, we won’t need to get into any dogfights. Our first priority should be shutting down that AI. Snowstorm’s going to act on the expo, so that gives us a little time-” Rodimus stopped as red gazes shifted uncomfortably away from him. “...okay, what?” he asked, spark sinking.

“Snowstorm moved the date of the expo up,” Darkwing answered. “Significantly. Skyquake was mad enough to spit rivets but even he can’t defy the Winglord to that degree.”

“Oh, Primus.” Rodimus ran a hand over his helm. “When is it?”

Darkwing shuffled. “Next cycle.”

The panic that seized Rodimus then was purely the dancer in him - _I can’t be ready to perform by next cycle!_ Then he remembered that he wasn’t going to _be_ performing, and the relief and disappointment was a strange, bitter mixture. “Well,” he said, giving a short, harsh vent. “That makes things more difficult.” He felt tension ripple through the Vosians. “But not impossible. I saw where the data hookups for the Zeta Tau Platform weapons all connected. If we can sever that, we can stop Snowstorm and Virtuoso-5 in their tracks.”

“Will that damage Virtuoso-5?” Cloudstreaker asked anxiously. “Permanently, I mean.”

“I couldn’t tell you,” Rodimus admitted. “I’ve never dealt with a city AI before.”

“Then we have to find another way.” Cloudstreaker turned, addressing his fellow Vosians. “We _can’t_ damage Virtuoso, can we? It’s our heritage! It kept us safe!”

“Until it didn’t anymore,” Static Ghost pointed out grimly from the back.

“That’s because its chosen Emirate wasn’t there to direct it! The Senate’s forces entered Vosian airspace without challenge-”

“Don’t you dare lay that on me!” Starscream protested.

_“Enough,”_ Rodimus barked. “This isn’t helping. If you have an idea of how to disable Virtuoso-5 without harming it, Cloudstreaker, I’m all audials, but people are more important than things, no matter their heritage.” Cloudstreaker shot him a furious glare, but allowed Darkwing to pull him back. “Let me put together a data packet and I’ll ping you what I remember. I’m not familiar with the platform in question, so you’ll have to help me plan the route.”

Darkwing frowned. “No offense, Rodimus, but that’s gonna be hard going without repulsors. Maybe you should stay here, let us handle the heavy work.”

“I thought I was the experienced warbuild.” Now it was Rodimus’s turn to glare. “I’m not sitting on my can when this is partly my mess to begin with. If you just deposit me where I can do some good-”

“Prime, I’m sorry, but there’s a good chance Snowstorm has guessed our goal and we don’t need to be dragging you around while we dodge his enforcers. You’re staying here where it’s safe.”

“Where I’m _trapped,_ ” Rodimus answered acidly.

“I’ll stay with him.”

Both Darkwing and Rodimus turned to stare at Cloudstreaker, who grimaced and shrugged. “I’m sorry, Darkwing, but… I just can’t be a part of this.”

Darkwing sighed. “I know.” He reached out a hand; Cloudstreaker clasped it. “I’ll comm you when it’s over and you can bring him in. Rodimus, I need that data packet.”

Defeated, Rodimus pinged it to him, and the Vosians got to work planning their attack. Rodimus left them to it, fading back to lean against the nearest intact support wall with only a sulking ex-Emirate for company.


	6. Chapter 6

“...and as I had surpassed all other candidates by quite some margin, Virtuoso-5 recognized my clear superiority and surrendered its passwords to me. Thus I became Vos’s twelfth Emirate!”

“Listen, strange AIs lying in towers and lobbing passwords at people is no basis for a system of government.”

Starscream gave Rodimus a black look. “And remind me where you got _your_ position of executive power, Prime?”

“It was derived from a mandate from the masses.” And Rodimus was amazed he could say that with a straight face.

Starscream shook his head at his chosen Prime’s obvious foolishness. “Anyway, that’s how I met Skywarp and Thundercracker. They were the only candidates to take their defeat with grace. ...Well. Mostly.”

Rodimus grinned. Starscream hadn’t quite forgiven him yet for throwing him under the bus with the Vosians, he was sure, but the quickest way to get back into the Seeker’s good books was to listen raptly while he talked about himself. “So? What was it like, hooking up to Virtuoso-5?”

“Rather disorienting at first.” Starscream sat at his ease in midair, legs crossed. “But once I got used to it, it was exhilarating. Nothing was hidden from me, in all the seven spires. I had complete control.”

“I’m surprised you gave it up.”

Starscream sighed. “Yes, well. City AI is a double-edged blade. I found myself rather -” He gestured vaguely. “Bound to Vos.”

Across the balcony, Cloudstreaker gave them both a furious look and stood. Rodimus braced himself, sure the living Vosian was about to pick another fight with the dead one, but instead he announced, “I need to go check on something.”

“Are the others all right?” Rodimus asked.

“I’m sure they are. Just wait here, all right? I’ll be right back.” He stepped into the air and transformed, deafening Rodimus with the roar of his thrusters. Rodimus and Starscream watched him go, then glanced at each other.

“Traitor,” they said in unison.

“He’s headed directly for the Command Tower,” Rodimus pointed out. “You’d think he’d be a little more subtle about it.”

“You did make a big glaring point of how you were trapped here,” Starscream answered.

“Sure did.” Rodimus stretched casually. “Right now he’s probably summoning up a half-wing of enforcers to drag my flightless skidplate back in. It’d be a shame if one of those fliers got hijacked somehow.”

“Rodimus Prime,” Starscream purred, sidling close enough that his wing brushed through Rodimus’s spoiler, “I am so _proud_ of you.”

Starscream slipped into the wind, merging into invisibility with it, and Rodimus was left behind to lean on the balcony and wonder if it was bad of him to feel this pleased about praise from the notorious Seeker. He hadn’t had any reason to suspect Cloudstreaker in particular, but he’d figured there was a good chance Darkwing’s group was harboring at least one spy, someone Comet couldn’t identify as being Snowstorm’s associate, and using himself as bait was the easiest way to flush them out. Starscream’s approval reassured him that his thinking was sound, at least, even as he regretted that it was Cloudstreaker he’d identified in this way. He’d liked Cloudstreaker.

Of course, he’d liked Snowstorm too. Maybe his taste in people was a problem.

Rodimus waited, calm as a still lake on Earth as six specks resolved themselves into six fliers. He didn’t even flinch as they transformed and surrounded him, an array of mismatched weapons trained on him. “I’m sorry to do this, Rodimus Prime,” Cloudstreaker announced, balancing on his repulsors with a dancer’s grace. “But Vos’s fate won’t be in your hands.”

Rodimus smiled slightly as he lifted his hands. “One last chance to back away from the abyss, Cloudstreaker.”

“My duty is clear, Prime. You’re a fair dancer, but you have no place in the city of fliers.” Cloudstreaker gestured. Two of the Seekers moved forward, reaching out to grab his arms; one of the other guards adjusted her aim.

Two bright bursts of laserfire hit the pair coming for Rodimus, sending them flying back. Rodimus turned and ran as the surviving Seekers shouted in fury at the seeming-traitor. A distinctly familiar voice echoed behind him, laughing - “Oh _dear!_ Did someone forget about me?”

 _“Starscream,_ you monster! Let her go!”

Rodimus retreated into the tower as Starscream led Cloudstreaker and his victim’s trinemates on a mad chase around the spire. The Seekers Starscream had shot were recovering, wavering in the air, and one of them nudged cautiously into the tower. Rodimus charged his wrist blasters.

“Back off,” he called. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“The feeling isn’t mutual,” said one of the Seekers, lifting his arms. His partner grabbed his elbow.

“Not in here, moron!” ei hissed. “The tower’s unstable, you could bring it crashing down on top of us!” Ei turned to glare at Rodimus. “Don’t you do anything stupid either, hear?”

“No problem,” Rodimus answered easily. “Hand-to-hand combat’s my best skill.”

The Seekers had just enough time to look nervous before Rodimus charged, and in the enclosed space demonstrated that an outnumbered Prime was not a defeated Prime. The foolish Seeker went down almost at once, a victim of a knee just below the cockpit, and Rodimus held him down while he checked the smarter Seeker’s lunge, catching hir arms in a punishing grip. The Seeker growled and tried to push Rodimus back, weapons whining with unspent charge near his face, but they were at the wrong angle to hit him and Rodimus would not let his opponent change that. “Just yield already!” the flier snapped.

Rodimus laughed in hir face. “You weren’t a ‘Con, were you?”

The Seeker’s expression grew injured. “No! But just because I wasn’t a factionmech doesn’t mean I can’t deal with you, _grounder!_ ”

Rodimus smirked. “Didn’t think so. ‘Cons have had the chance to learn that grounders don’t just roll over at the sight of a flier.” He shifted his grip and twisted. The Seeker yelped, repulsors firing on instinct, and that just served Rodimus’s purpose - ei lost hir purchase and went flying into the far wall, where ei fell with an inglorious clatter of plating.

The Seeker below his knee grunted. “Slagger!”

“Shut up.” Rodimus pressed his fist to the Seeker’s nasal ridge, his wrist lasers humming in threat. “I’m pretty sure I can put your lights out without threatening this tower’s structural integrity at this distance.”

The Seeker quieted, and Rodimus wondered what Snowstorm, or more likely Cloudstreaker, had told them. Had they really believed this would be so easy? It was nearly quiet in the tower now, enough that he could hear the sounds of engines and laserfire outside. Arrow-sharp shapes flashed by the broken windows; Rodimus looked away as another burst of laserfire sounded.

The doorway darkened. Rodimus looked up to see Cloudstreaker, his optics haggard and triumphant; he swore softly before the Seeker spoke. “Well? Are you coming or not?”

“Starscream!” Rodimus grinned in open, honest relief. Starscream actually looked shocked.

“Just get up here. This tower is compromised, so we’re bringing the fight to Snowstorm!” Starscream beckoned imperiously. Rodimus leaped to his pedes, abandoning his prisoner without a second thought, and ran to him.

His prisoner struggled up on one elbow. “I didn’t believe it,” he rasped. “But you really are the Prime, aren’t you?”

Rodimus turned, one arm over Starscream/Cloudstreaker’s shoulder. “Today,” he said, “I’m a dancer.” Starscream kicked off of the balcony, lifting them both away from the broken spire.

Vos fell away beneath him, and for a moment Rodimus lost himself in terror/exhilaration. Exhilaration because he was _flying_ without a shuttle or anything else between him and the wind, which was something he rarely got to experience; terror because the being making this possible was not quite trustworthy. There was probably something deeply wrong with Rodimus, that _that_ made his spark quicken more than anything else.

“Enjoying yourself?” Starscream caroled smugly in his audial, and Rodimus tried not to stiffen in the Seeker’s grip.

“Yeah,” he said, “for the first time I really am thinking about getting antigravs.”

“They wouldn’t suit you.” Starscream cut the power to his own antigravs and the two of them dropped, Rodimus stifling a most unPrimelike shriek, and descended on Bridgeway like a pair of vengeful angels. “Weapons ready!” Starscream ordered, a battlefield command, and Rodimus obeyed the Decepticon as they landed hard on the staging platform between the Dance Tower and the bulk of the spire, breaking the formation of Snowstorm’s enforcers before they could fully swarm around Darkwing’s band of embattled miscreants. The dancers, numbering less than twenty - with two fallen, that Rodimus could see - shouted with one voice as he straightened, wrist lasers hot as live wires as he aimed them at the suddenly-uncertain enforcers massing in a loose wedge formation overhead.

_Wonder if this is what Optimus felt like when he first stood between Megatron and everything he wanted to conquer._

“Cloudstreaker!” Darkwing called jubilantly, starting up to approach them. “Welcome to the party!”

“Cloudstreaker betrayed you,” Rodimus called back. “Starscream’s borrowing his body.”

He _felt_ the other mech’s spark crack, but his stride didn’t slow, and in a moment he was standing at Rodimus’s left shoulder, next to Starscream on his right. “We’ve cut six of Virtuoso-5’s connections to Vos,” he said. “But one of the ones that’re left is the main connection. Snowstorm doesn’t need more than that to make Vos his own personal playground.”

“Then what’s he waiting for?” Rodimus wondered.

_“You, of course.”_

“Oh, slag,” Darkwing hissed as a massive hologram of the Emirate, as tall to them as they would be to humans, sprang to life over the landing. The enforcers’ formation abruptly tightened, Seekers saluting in unison with a crash of fists against breastplates. “Highw- Rodimus, you gotta get outta here,” Darkwing said.

“And go where?” Rodimus stepped forward, hands on his hips. _“Snowstorm!”_ he bellowed. “Because I’m such a class act, I’m gonna give you one last chance to surrender.”

 _“You said that last time,”_ Snowstorm pointed out acidly, _“and you’re every bit as outgunned this time.”_

“You fire on me and it’ll be an act of war.” Rodimus stepped forward, closer to the mass of Snowstorm’s troops.

The holographic Emirate smirked, an expression Rodimus had never seen on his face before. _“Cybertron can ill afford another war. Iacon is wise enough to know that, I think.”_ He gestured to his troops; they closed in, their wings blocking out the light. _“Trading the life of their Prime for their submission to Vos’s yoke will be an easy decision in that light.”_

Rodimus’s spark sank. “What do you mean, Vos’s yoke?”

_“Well. You saw those files. You really don’t think Virtuoso-5 can’t control two cities?”_

Rodimus felt his spark sink. _So that was his endgame all along, was it?_

“He’s crazy,” Static Ghost breathed. “He’s slag-eating crazy.”

“Don’t look at me, I didn’t vote for him,” said one of the other dancers, loudly enough that the Emirate and his enforcers could hear.

Rodimus wanted to block them all out. He wanted to run, to start shooting, but a Prime couldn’t fly off the handle like Hot Rod could. He had to think. He had to stop this before it had a chance to destroy everything he’d worked so hard to build.

 _I want to go home!_ part of him wailed. _Just let me go home and I swear I’ll never dance again!_

_...yeah, that’s a lie._

He heard Starscream laugh, loud and sharp and derisive, like this was a battle he’d already won. “You have yet to prove you can control _one_ city, pretender, let alone two!”

 _“Are you challenging me, Starscream?”_ Snowstorm’s image bent to glower at the body-borrowing ghost, and a strange crackling hum filled the air. _“I am Vos’s Emirate, not you, you walking rust infection! I have the power, I have the will, and - I - have - Virtuoso!”_

The hum accelerated into a roar. The floor shifted and buckled under Rodimus’s pedes as the Seekers took off like a startled flock of pigeons, leaving their grounder ally to stumble backward and leap for a handhold before the transformation of the landing deck could dump him who-knew-where. He wrapped his hands and his thighs around a railing, clinging tightly as a weapons deck emerged from where the platform had been.

Distantly, he heard shouting. _“What the scrap is THAT doing there?” “Has it been there all this time?” “Bridgeway, he’s turning Bridgeway against its own citizens!” “Where’s Rodimus?”_

Darkwing’s outraged shout cut through their chatter as the weapons powered up. _“You vapor-brains! You left the grounder behind!”_

_“Hey, so did you!”_

Rodimus lit his optics. The weapons bristled from the platform, aiming laser cannons and electric pulse blasters at his airborne allies. A strange, echoing calm stole over him - one that was familiar to him, one that had allowed him to save Springer on Goo and seen him through the most frenetic and desperate of battles. His processor, its capabilities boosted exponentially by the Matrix, took in the angles and distances of the small forest of weapons and marked out a constellation of targets, as clear as a map in his mind.

“Darkwing,” he bellowed, _“kill those connections,”_ and he leaped.

Gravity served him. He landed hard on the first laser cannon, forcing it down before the deadly energy in its throat could shoot a single Seeker out of the sky; it blasted the next weapon in line instead. Rodimus leaped back from the explosion, onto the nose of a pulse emitter that made his pedes go numb to stand on it. “Oh no you don’t,” he snarled at it, and aimed both wrist blasters. His shots landed unnerringly where he aimed them, taking out the weapon’s control system and power supply, and it drooped. Rodimus angled his pedes, sliding down the barrel until he ran out of space, then leaped, backflipping in the air to catch a second laser cannon between his powerful thighs.

 _“What do you think you’re doing?”_ Snowstorm was sounding more and more like a cartoon villain, and Rodimus smirked at the thought.

“What does it look like?” he shouted, firing shot after shot upside down, wreaking havoc on Virtuoso’s battle platform. “I’m a dancer. I’m _dancing!”_

_“You’ll be dancing to a different tune when I’m done with you!”_

The cannon Rodimus was hanging onto flicked up sharply, and not even his powerful legs could keep their grip. He was flung out and away, swearing, hands flinging out for anything to save him from a long, long fall. Someone yelled his name and he turned in the air, reaching out for the thick wire swinging his way.

He caught it - just barely, and it swung him out and up, and he saw a flash of silver waggling his wings at him. “Thanks, Comet!” he called, and then the wire was swinging him back again, right into the deadly forest of the weapons platform, still smoking from the damage it had already sustained. His vents shuttered, protecting his internals from the acrid smoke, and Rodimus grimly latched onto a cannon support to continue his work, one knee and one hand gripping the support pillar. “All right, you glitch,” he growled, pulling his cable forward with his free hand. “Virtuoso versus Prime, round two.”

The cable was tied securely around the pillar, giving Rodimus an escape route this time, and he climbed up and away from the smoke, to the relative safety of a dead laser cannon. “For freedom and justice, you glitchspawn!” he bellowed, and started firing.

Power units went up one after the other, shaking the platform with the force of their explosions. Smoke billowed around him, obscuring his view of the sky. He couldn’t tell where Darkwing’s squad was, or Starscream for that matter, and he didn’t know any of their comm codes. He could only hope they were okay, and keep firing. Another weapons mount went dead, landing across the barrel of the next cannon in line, forcing its nose down. It whined angrily, power collecting in its throat, struggling for a firing solution it couldn’t resolve. Alight with inspiration, Rodimus jumped down, catching himself on a support across from the restricted cannon and sliding down to perch just above its base, both pedes braced along its length. “That’s right,” he grinned, boosting his power output to give the cannon a nice red thermal scan to aim at. “Come to papa.”

He dove away, letting himself fall over the side, just as the cannon fired; as the platform lurched and shook under the resultant explosions, he caught himself on an overhang and swung himself out again, flying like an acrobat to the lifeline Comet had given him. Heat washed over him in a concussive blast, flinging him free on his wire; he turned in the air, used a brief moment of slack to wrap the frayed and heat-glowing end of it around his ankle as a safety measure. “Starscream, if you can hear me,” he called. “If anyone can hear me - find Snowstorm! Help me find him and I’ll end this!”

He climbed, hand over hand, leaving behind the smoking ruin of the weapons platform that was supposed to host a dancers’ expo. Above him, the towers of Bridgeway shook, veiled in smoke as the Vosians screamed by overhead, trading laser blasts and screams of defiance. From below, Rodimus could barely tell one side from the other, save that Snowstorm’s mechs were much better armed.

He climbed on. Higher and higher, as below and above him Bridgeway bristled with old weaponry - half of it barely functional, frozen in energyless stasis or moving uselessly in little clockwork jerks. It barely resembled the thriving, cheerily defiant Bridgeway Rodimus had come to know.

“I hope you’re watching, Snowstorm,” he gasped out. “This is the consequence of bad leadership.”

_You’d better remember this yourself, Rodimus Prime._

Somehow his inner critic’s voice had begun to sound suspiciously like Starscream’s. He shook it off - now was the worst possible time! - and reapplied himself to climbing. 

The line led him up to a decking overlooking what had been the dancers’ landing. He cast about for a way to get higher still; failing that, he looked for a friendly pair of wings. Blue-green flashed by overhead and circled around: Cloudstreaker’s body, still with Starscream in the pilot’s chair.

“You’ve never held onto a body this long,” Rodimus commented when Starscream slowed and descended to hover in front of him.

“Fits me like a glove.” Starscream held up a hand, preening. There were laser scorch marks on his wings. “Though I could do without the unfortunate color scheme. And Cloudstreaker didn’t bother to install weapons on his mainframe.”

Rodimus shook his head. “How are the others doing?”

“Stymied in sight of the finishing beacon.” Starscream scowled, arms crossed, and Rodimus didn’t point out how much more _flier_ his turns of phrase were becoming since they came to Vos. “The main connection is being guarded by half the enforcers in the city. One grounder, no matter how blessed by the Matrix, is unlikely to turn the tide.”

“You’re underestimating me.” Rodimus bent to untie his ankle. “I just need the right lever.” He glanced up, optics narrowing against the glare of laserfire. “Where is Snowstorm?”

“What makes you think I know?”

“Because you were the last master of Virtuoso-5.” Rodimus held out a hand to him. “You’ve seen Snowstorm’s setup. If anyone in this city knows how to get to Snowstorm, it’s you.”

Starscream glared at that hand, but Rodimus didn’t withdraw it, steady as Earth’s sun. “You’ve already discovered more of our secrets than any Iaconian should have been allowed,” he informed his Prime, gripping his hand and pulling him plating-to-plating.

“It’s a new city,” Rodimus grinned. “The future of Cybertron belongs to us young upstarts, not you old war rigs anymore.”

“We’ll see about that.” Starscream lifted off, grinning fiercely with Rodimus clinging to his shoulders. Weapons platform after weapons platform turned to fire at them as they rose up the spire, screaming their fury, and Rodimus added his own wrist blasters to the cacophony, watching Starscream’s back as he flew. Up and up they went, blasting through what was left of the enforcers’ defensive overhead screen formation, Rodimus shouting to a flash of silver and pink as they went. “Tell Darkwing we’re going to take out the control office!” He didn’t know if Comet heard him, and Starscream didn’t slow to make sure.

Up they went, past the Command Tower, to the very pinnacle of Bridgeway. Even here the metal bore scars, signs of old, old war damage. Starscream set Rodimus down at the very top, hanging onto the communications array to keep from sliding down.

“Of course,” Rodimus gasped. “Fliers go up to feel safe. Where’s the door?”

“Where do you want it?” Starscream smirked.

“Right.” Rodimus in-vented deeply. “Sorry for putting another hole in your city.”

The Prime’s fist wrecked the metal roof of the spire like it was cardboard, and Rodimus dropped through, not needing Starscream’s help to land on his pedes. The floor rang with the impact, and Rodimus straightened with arms lifted, blasters ready to take out any resistance as Starscream floated down after him.

There was only Snowstorm - but a Snowstorm Rodimus barely recognized, half-obscured by hookups in every available port, optics wide and wild and almost white with panic and data-overload. Rodimus saw how his hands had formed tense helpless claws around the arms of the chair he was in, and almost lowered his weapons. “Snowstorm, shut it down,” Rodimus ordered, and Snowstorm’s fingers twitched.

Starscream shoved him to the ground with a snap of warning as lasers burned the air where he’d been. The rig Snowstorm sat in was suddenly bristling with remote-access blasters like a deadly halo over his head. “Thanks,” Rodimus gasped as he shot out the blaster that had nearly killed him.

“Don’t make me do that again,” Starscream harshed, and added his own weapons to the exchange. The guns blazed in all directions, just like the weapons platforms all over Bridgeway, and Rodimus had to duck and weave to keep his plating intact. “Don’t kill Snowstorm, just take out the blasters!” Starscream shouted as he moved to keep Rodimus between himself and their targeting systems.

“Amazing. The words are Autobot, but the voice sounds just like Starscream.”

“It’ll just make them fire blindly and rapidly, you fool!” Starscream swatted his shoulder. Unlike all the other times the ghost had taken a swipe at him, _this_ swipe connected, jogging Rodimus’s arm just enough that his shot hit the power rig over Snowstorm’s head, not the weapon he was aiming for. Sparks blew out in a hissing spray and Snowstorm twitched.

“Slaggit, Starscream,” Rodimus hissed, and Starscream grunted and backed up. “Some cover would be nice!”

“Clearly Snowstorm’s interior decorators weren’t inclined to set up chest-high walls for the invaders’ convenience!”

“And so you use me as a blast shield instead,” Rodimus pointed out, pounding away with blast after blast at the halo of blasters until the only ones left intact were the ones that couldn’t aim anywhere near them. With them still firing uselessly at the walls, Rodimus stepped forward, grabbed Snowstorm by his collar fairing and dragged him free from the control rig. Snowstorm screeched, his hands flying to his helm, and collapsed to the decking when Rodimus let him go. “It won’t listen,” he gasped, optics pale and wild. “It’s gone crazy!”

“Of course it has, you fool,” Starscream scorned. “You brought it online with six of Vos’s spires destroyed by war. It’s in panic mode! If you’ve been aiming it at fliers it’ll fire at everything that moves!”

“Holy slag,” Rodimus shuddered. “Can you shut it down, Starscream?”

“Possibly. Hold this shell a moment.” Rodimus took hold of Cloudstreaker’s shoulders and Starscream rose up from his body, into the overhead control rig.

“What’s…” Cloudstreaker stirred groggily in Rodimus’s grip. “Highway?”

Starscream went flying out backwards with a piercing shriek of rage that left them both wincing. Snowstorm twitched on the floor, reaching weakly for the control chair, and Cloudstreaker gasped his name and knelt to help him. Rodimus let him go as Starscream disgruntledly reappeared through the wall.

“So, that’s a no,” he drawled.

“Fine.” Rodimus stepped over the pair of political prisoners and took the miniature comm console he saw on the arm of the chair. On the screen he saw the hologram of Snowstorm pop to life again, but it was his own voice that came out of it.

“This is Rodimus Prime. Emirate Snowstorm is down. Repeat, Snowstorm is down.”

“He’s still alive,” Cloudstreaker hissed, easing Snowstorm’s half-limp form into his lap.

“Is he in any condition to retake control of Virtuoso? No?” Cloudstreaker wouldn’t meet his optics. “Then quit arguing.” Rodimus turned back to the console. “Enforcers - you might have already figured this out, but Virtuoso’s having trouble telling friend from foe right now, so it’s in your best interest to fall back. Darkwing, everyone - it’s up to you. Shut this thing down.”

The comm console filled with acknowledgement pings from all over the spire. He heard a surge of voices, Enforcers and dancer-rebels alike demanding his attention, but one voice soared above them all, a war cry that rang through Bridgeway: Darkwing’s voice, as he dove through the shreds of the Enforcer barricade.

_“I AM THE TERROR THAT FLAPS IN THE NIGHT!”_


	7. Chapter 7

Rodimus Prime, resplendent in his signature reds and golds, leaped down from the last ledge leading to the central walkway. It had yet to be patched up from the Battle of Bridgeway, as the news broadcasts were calling it, since the Vosians were currently between governments. Hopefully, Rodimus could help change that today. But the streets were deserted, he still didn’t have antigravs, and Starscream had buzzed off somewhere, leaving Rodimus without so much as a guide to get him to the spot where Vos’s destiny was going to be decided. Time was running out.

“Hey!” he called up to a Vosian he caught watching him from hir balcony. “How do you get to Solus Dance Hall?”

The Vosian grinned. “Practice!”

“Hey.” Rodimus shook a reproving finger. “Snarky answers are _my_ thing.”

“Typical Iaconian, always have to claim whatever metal you’re standing on.”

Rodimus turned. “Skyquake!”

Skyquake, impeccably polished and detailed, grinned at him from the doorway he’d just emerged from. “Hello, Highway - sorry, Rodimus Prime.” Rodimus shrugged apologetically. “Suddenly a lot of missing pieces about you are falling into place. I saw the stunt-jumps you were pulling on Zeta Tau Platform. I didn’t teach you that.”

“What are you talking about? I was tarting it up!” Rodimus huffed, mock-offended, until Skyquake laughed. “Hey, Skyquake? Would you have authorized my coming here if you’d known who I was?”

“Honestly?” Skyquake tipped his head back, burgundy optics thoughtful. “All that matters is how you dance. That’s what I’ve always said. I’d like to think I would have given Rodimus Prime the same chance I gave Highway, but… I think I would have hesitated.”

“Thank you,” Rodimus offered shyly, “for your honesty. And for giving me this chance. I’m sorry I had to lie to you to get it.”

Skyquake shrugged uncomfortably. “I’ve been forcibly reminded that I don’t always know who people are the way I think I do. And if our situations were reversed - if I had to repaint myself in order to get on a pole again - I’d do it without a second thought.”

Rodimus grinned, relieved. “Let’s go build a world where no one has to lie in order to dance.”

Skyquake laughed. “Ambitious, aren’t we? Come on, up you get.” He held out an arm and Rodimus took it trustingly, letting the big Vosian pull him close and take off with him.

***

The Solus Dance Hall had been beautifully restored to its prewar glory since Snowstorm had taken power. Unfortunately, being awkwardly sandwiched between two dead weapons platforms rather diminished the effect, but if Rodimus blocked the sight of them out the exquisitely-decorated arch that led into the hall was still quite lovely, with swirling cloudlike designs worked in gold and copper. Beyond, a circular dance stage with two shiny black poles already installed, close enough that a dancer on one pole could reach out and brush the fingertips of the dancer on the other; wing-friendly chairs set around the stage; and a wide, high ceiling glittering with crystals like stars.

“Very glamorous,” he commented, pausing to take it all in.

“Flamestep danced here, you know,” Skyquake told him quietly. “Often. Before the war, before Vos closed its borders. She was magnificent with steelsilk in her hands.”

“You knew her?”

Skyquake’s optics creased in a faint, faraway smile. “She was the one who made me want to be a dancer. Just this little slip of an Iaconian, and me, this big bulky thing, wanting to follow in her every footstep. My creator thought I was crazy.”

Rodimus smiled. “Well, from one big bulky thing to another, you proved them wrong.”

Skyquake snorted, but he was smiling. The two of them approached the stage, Rodimus already going over his routine in his head, when their approach was noticed and two sleek figures launched from the spectators’ benches to land hard on the stage, blatantly staking their claim. _So much for Iaconians being the claim-staking ones,_ Rodimus thought, weathering twin scarlet glares with an unimpressed look of his own.

“Etherjewel, Firejewel.” Skyquake sounded equally unimpressed. “You’ll have your chance. Quit being such afts.”

“You don’t have the right to command us anymore,” Firejewel hissed. “You might be content to let the Autobot Prime clip your wings, but we haven’t forgotten our pride!”

“You’ll _have your chance_ to display that pride on the pole,” Skyquake told them evenly, ignoring the clipped-wings comment. “But so will Rodimus Prime. It’s thanks to him Bridgeway is still standing. He’s earned the right to dance for Vos’s future.”

Etherjewel’s expression crumbled. “How could you say such a thing?”

“Enough.” Skyquake waved his words away. The hall was filling up, spectators jockeying for position. “Get off the stage, the beginners are about to come on. Rodimus, go let the attendants fuss over you a bit, it’ll do you good. You know the dance schedule?” Rodimus nodded. “Good. I need to go find Darkwing. He’s ringleading this mess.”

“He’s not dancing?” Rodimus asked.

Skyquake shrugged. “You’ll have to ask him about that.”

Rodimus frowned, but let it go as Skyquake turned to see to his work. He could see Firejewel and Etherjewel disappearing through an alcove at the back of the room, and followed them; the gatekeeper program beeped in acknowledgement as he passed.

_Wonder where that information’s going - to the server in the security room, I guess. ...Wonder if it would’ve gone to Virtuoso-5 once._

He could feel the tension crackle over his plating as the dancers’ optics turned to him, Firejewel and Etherjewel among them. He put his hands on his hips and gave them his best rogueish grin. “Greetings, natives. I come in peace.”

He got about equal parts outrage-noises to guffaws at that; a silver flash charged forward to fling himself on Rodimus in a hug. “Hi, Comet,” Rodimus laughed. “Are you dancing today too?”

Comet beamed up at him, more excitement and life than Roddy had ever seen in him - it must have felt good being out of Snowstorm’s shadow. “We’re doing a traditional display dance with the other beginner’s class. We get to dance with steelsilk!”

“No kidding?” Rodimus grinned. “Can’t wait to see.”

“What about you, are you dancing for the debate?”

“I’m not really sure how I’m fitting in,” Rodimus admitted. “I get it’s all about stirring up important feelings before the vote happens, so I guess I’m dancing for the anti-Separatists. I don’t know if I’m dancing for Darkwing in particular though.”

Comet shook his head. “Darkwing isn’t in the running.”

“He isn’t?”

“Said he’d rather be a policymaker than the Emirate. I heard Sterling was going to offer him the Minister of Culture post if she won.”

Rodimus pictured it: stern, no-nonsense Sterling, whipping a gaggle of Vosian politicians into shape the way she had her students, and Darkwing elbows-deep in resurrecting Vosian cultural traditions with her backing. Steelsilk dancing was just the start. “Is there a Minister of Culture post?”

“Not yet.” Comet grinned. “What about in Iacon?”

“Nope. Maybe I should see about appointing someone. Maybe Starscream,” he added, nudging Comet’s shoulder, and Comet laughed.

“If you appoint him to _anything,_ I won’t come to Iacon to visit you,” he threatened, and Rodimus lifted both hands in mock-surrender. “I have to go, I can see everyone’s getting into formation.”

“Good luck,” Rodimus told him, and let him go. Seconds later, Comet ran back to him, flung his arms around him in a tight hug, then let go and dashed off again.

“Huh,” he muttered, watching Comet slip into formation with the rest of his classmates. One of them, a dancer whose blue optics and pinky-red paint looked familiar, caught his optic and waved excitedly. Rodimus made a shooing motion, chuckling, and the dancer made a show of going ‘oops’ and snapping back into formation as the instructors passed around the steelsilk drapes.

As the beginner classes filed past, Rodimus stepped back to allow them room and bumped into someone who squeaked breathlessly against his spoiler. “Oh, sorry,” he murmured, stepping back, and found himself looking into Boomer’s optics. She was clutching a drape nervously in her hands.

“You’re dancing?” he blurted.

Boomer nodded. “Last-minute cancellation, so I’m filling in. Wish me luck.”

“Good luck,” Rodimus said, but Boomer was already moving, her motions quick and nervous. She settled in beside the pinky-red Vosian, who favored her with a chirpy greeting - “hi, I’m Redwing, nice to meet you-!” before they all filed out into the dance hall.

“Huh,” he murmured, peering out to watch them circle the hall, drapes trailing dramatically behind them. “The kids are all right.”

His plating prickled as Etherjewel joined him in peering through the door. “We’re going to win, you know,” he said conversationally.

“So you aren’t welded to your brother,” Rodimus answered lightly. “I wondered.”

He wasn’t looking, but he felt Etherjewel glare. “This is just a game to you, but it’s life and death to us. That’s why we’re going to win. Vos will have a leader who values her above all else, and you will no longer be welcome.”

“A leader like Snowstorm?” Rodimus affected boredom to cover his sudden anger. “You think I’m not willing to put my life on the line, but where were you when Snowstorm was pointing his blasters at his own people?” Overhead, the dancers whirled, the drapes fluttering open to reveal a constellation of star patterns. “That’s what people are going to go to the voting booths remembering. It’s hard to forget with the streets still scarred from his little tantrum with Virtuoso.”

Etherjewel sighed loudly, leaning against the opposite doorjamb. “Snowstorm’s ideals weren’t wrong,” he argued, though he didn’t sound like his spark was in it. “He just - became misguided.”

“Yeah,” Rodimus murmured. “Fear of outside ideas will do that to you.”

Etherjewel scoffed and pushed himself away. “Get slagged. We’re still going to win,” he informed the Prime, and stormed off like a grumpy cloud. Rodimus shrugged and went back to watching the dancers. They circled overhead, their drapes trailing behind them, then split like a kaleidoscope into trines. The trines linked hands and wheeled overhead, and in the patterns they created Rodimus began to see an echo of the repeated motifs in their steelsilk wraps.

The dance ended with a dramatic landing on the center stage. Across from his vantage point, Rodimus could see three young Vosians clutching each others’ hands tight in their glee: Redwing laughing, Comet smiling, and Boomer with her free hand over her mouth like she’d just been given such a wonderful gift she almost feared to let the full force of her joy break free.

_Trine,_ Rodimus realized with a sudden shock.

He backed up as the beginner classes flooded out of the performance hall and into the back room, bringing a cacophony of excited chatter with them. Out of the small forest of wings Comet emerged, Redwing and Boomer’s hands clutched in his own, and charged straight to Rodimus for a group hug.

“Congratulations, you three,” Rodimus told them, and was rewarded with their bright smiles. “You were great out there.”

“Not as good as you,” Redwing breathed. “At least I know I wasn’t! I can’t wait to see your dance, are you dancing to more Earth music?”

“That’s the plan.” Rodimus let the three of them tow him to the back of the room, where the more advanced dancers were getting polished up and tuned up by a small fleet of attendants. Comet found Rodimus a chair while Redwing hunted down someone to do Rodimus’s detailing and Boomer asked for a copy of the music Rodimus was planning to dance to.

“What is this?” Boomer asked, optics flickering as she reviewed the file.

“It’s the opening song to a game.” Rodimus shrugged, greeting the attendant Redwing towed over with an apologetic wave. “My friend Jazz shared it with me back on Earth, before I became the Prime.”

“Jazz!” Redwing gasped. “I’ve heard of him! We’ve all heard of him. Is it true he filled the Decepticon base with sparkly bubbles once?”

“So he claims.” Rodimus grinned, gratified that his friend’s notoriety had spread even to the youth of Vos. “Blitzwing refuses to corroborate it, but that may just be out of spite.” 

Redwing laughed, bright and incautious, and Rodimus marveled at what a good match hir boundless, open-sparked enthusiasm was for the other two - Comet’s dreamy insightfulness, Boomer’s quietly driven ambition. Suddenly he wanted to hug them, but if he moved the attendant fussing over the state of his paint - admittedly, pretty shabby after he’d stripped the Highway disguise - would lose her spot, and probably scold him. So he held still, and beamed like a goof at the new trine instead.

One by one, the dancers left the room to perform for the future of Vos, singly or in pairs. The rest of the dancers talked quietly, and Rodimus could tell which side they were on by whether or not they were willing to involve him in conversation, even with a brief glance or a smile. A few of them clustered at the entryway to watch as Rodimus had done, and the sounds of applause and appreciative voices and complex Vosian music filtered past them to Rodimus’s audials.

“Sounds like they’re having a good time out there,” Rodimus murmured, and Boomer nodded.

“They’re basically alternating,” she said quietly. “The Separatists and the Anti-Separatists, I mean. I can’t tell who’s winning.”

“Snowstorm told me once that you can never tell until the votes are all in,” Comet murmured, optics dim. Redwing patted his back worriedly. “So maybe we won’t know until then.”

“Would a dance really change anybody’s mind?” Rodimus wondered.

“It has before,” Redwing said. “Or that’s what my history datatrack said, anyway. Vorn and vorn ago, there was this election between Farsight and - someone else, they didn’t win anyway.”

“There was a rumor that Vos’s gates were closed to groundframes so that Flamestep couldn’t dance for the elections when Starscream was a candidate,” Boomer put in. “I doubt it’s true, but it didn’t hurt Starscream’s chances.”

A disturbing thought occurred to Rodimus. “Did _Starscream_ dance?”

The trine exchanged glances and burst into giggles, much to Rodimus’s chagrin. “Noo-ooo,” Redwing quavered. “I don’t think so.”

“I can’t picture it,” Boomer snickered.

“He didn’t seem like the dancing type, when we spoke,” Comet commented, tilting his head to one side, and his trinemates stared at him. “What?”

“You _talked_ to him?” Redwing demanded, somewhere between scandalized and gleeful. “Spill! What was he like?”

“Well…”

Rodimus’s attendant patted him on the shoulder, letting him know she was done, and Rodimus realized he had a ping waiting in his queue. “Sorry, you three, but I need to talk to Darkwing. I’ll see you later.”

“Oh - sure,” Boomer said, leaving Redwing to poke Comet. She waved as Rodimus levered himself out of his chair and headed to the front of the room where Darkwing was doing what he did best: wrangling flighty performers.

“Hey, boss,” he greeted the flier, and Darkwing cocked an optic ridge at him.

“Feeling confident?” he asked.

“Yep!”

“Well, I’m about to change that.” Darkwing spun the datapad he’d been tapping at around to show him. “You weren’t the only last-minute addition to the program, so I’ve had to make a few changes. You’re dancing last - right after Firejewel and Etherjewel.”

Rodimus tilted his head. “That’s supposed to make me unconfident?”

“Are you-” Darkwing flung his hands up. “You’re the encore! _And_ you’re dancing right after the biggest show-stealers in the tower! People are going to expect something amazing from you - the kind of performance it takes a lunar cycle to put together.”

“Oh.” Rodimus’s head tilted the other way, mentally reviewing the routine he’d thrown together in the space of two rotations. “...um. Huh.” Darkwing gave him a pointed look. “I’ll just have to make it really, really sexy? ...or not,” he admitted when Darkwing facepalmed. “I’ll think about it.”

“I’ve given you all the help I can,” Darkwing said. “Since somehow I wound up organizing this cluster bomb. I’m not exactly a neutral party,” he added, sounding rather peevish.

Rodimus laughed. “Hey, people trust you. And after that skirmish I can see why.”

“...you think?”

Darkwing was smiling, half-hidden under a ducked-down helm over his datapad; Rodimus quietly patted himself on the back, thinking he’d made today worthwhile no matter how the dance came out. “Yeah,” he confirmed, and Darkwing’s flaps wiggled. “Thanks for letting me know. I might have an idea, actually.”

“Oh yeah?” Darkwing gave him an interested glance.

“It might not work, but, I mean, I have one.” Rodimus gave him a rogueish grin. “If it doesn’t work, I’ll just play _Don’t Stop Believing_ for my dance and dazzle ‘em with power chords.”

“You and your power chords!” Darkwing flapped a hand at him. Rodimus laughed and sauntered back to the new trine, gears already spinning in his head about his plans to step up his dance - quite literally.

***

Boomer, Redwing, and Comet were over the moon when Rodimus explained his idea. While the rest of the dancers watched and critiqued the performances, Rodimus and the trine had their heads together modifying Rodimus’s routine. There was no time or space to rehearse, so the math had to be _absolutely perfect_ \- he and Boomer were the swiftest calculators, so they scribbled out their figures and diagrams between them while Redwing hovered curiously over their shoulders and Comet trotted back and forth between them, the doorway, and the refreshment table. Rodimus, conscious of his tendency to refuse fuel when stressed, made himself drink a few swallows of what Comet brought, trying not to grimace visibly at the intense taste of the high-octane fuel that physically active fliers needed.

The jet-grade did its work, though: Rodimus’s fluttery tank settled, his processor picked up the extra energy and sharpened its focus, and his body hummed with readiness to dance. He and Boomer finished fine-tuning their calculations just as Comet returned again with the report that Firejewel and Etherjewel were about to take the stage.

“This I have to see,” he confided. Redwing grinned and took his hand, tugging him toward the entryway. Most of the dancers, having given their performances, had filtered back to the hammocks and perches to flop down in happy exhaustion, leaving the way clear for Rodimus and his team to spectate. One of them called out as they peered through the doorway: “Good luck following that act, Prime!”

Rodimus scoffed over his shoulder. “In my experience, there’s no such thing as luck.” Nobody else got why he snickered as he watched the speaker introduce the twins.

Firejewel and Etherjewel bowed to opposite ends of the stage, to a scatter of applause. “We dance for the honor of Old Vos,” the former announced. “For the preservation of our beloved towers against _all_ foreign threats.”

“For the preservation of our culture,” Etherjewel added, and though his optics didn’t even flicker toward the doorway, Rodimus was sure he knew they were watching. “This will be our finest performance. I hope your sparks are moved.”

Prerecorded Vosian music swelled through the hall, full of lancing notes like a coronation fanfare. The twins turned in unison, floated in lazy spirals up to the tops of their poles and latched on, leaning back to clasp their hands together. For a moment they formed a bridge between poles as though between towers, then the percussion hit the air like a hammer and they broke apart. Rodimus felt his own spark pulse with the music, watching the twins throw themselves into spins that came within a wire’s breadth of collision.

“Wow,” Redwing whispered.

The twins’ spins slowed as they kicked out into flag poses. Firejewel turned in the air and locked his ankles around Etherjewels’, arresting both of their movements. Rodimus hissed his vents in amazement as they lifted themselves into the air - legs braced against each other, shoulders braced against their respective poles, nothing else touching anything but air. The crowd whooped and cheered their approval, and for a moment Rodimus was tempted to join them.

The twins disengaged, grinning at the audience, and threw themselves into the next stage of the dance: frenetic and nakedly erotic, switching poles as often as they traded caresses in midair, making the crowd whistle hungrily at them. Rodimus was pulled in by the arch of Etherjewel’s back, the tilt of Firejewel’s hips; Firejewel’s flashed smile and Etherjewel’s graceful hands. The two of them didn’t mirror each other, but complemented each other, like two wings on a jet as it threw itself into a spiral, and with their shining thighs wrapped around the poles, Firejewel and Etherjewel soared.

Watching them, Rodimus felt simultaneously light as gossamer and very, very heavy - the way an amazing, challenging dance always made him feel. He quietly made a resolution to tell the twins so, at the earliest opportunity, as the music faded away.

Shining with triumph, the twins chorused, _“The cities bow to Primus’s Crown!”_

All Rodimus’s intentions of extending his olive branch died a swift, ugly death. Beside him, Boomer rumbled her engine. “Rude.”

“Why? What does that mean?” Comet wondered.

“It’s a slogan the old Emiracy used to promote Vosian exceptionalism before everything went to slag in the war,” Boomer explained. “Basically they’re being afts.”

“It was also used in Decepticon propaganda,” Rodimus added. “I saw the posters sometimes when we ran missions aboveground.” He fielded a trio of intrigued glances with a wan smile. “War stories later. We need to stay focused on our performance.”

“Do you really think we can follow them?” Redwing asked, hir face pinched in worry. “That was an amazing dance right up until the slogan thing.”

Rodimus sighed. “As a dancer, I admire their skill. As Prime, I respect their views even if I can’t share them.” He paused just long enough to let their anticipation build. “On a personal level, they’re a pair of skidmarks and we are gonna dance so much better than them their heads’ll spin. Come on.”

Laughing, the trine followed him out of the door and down to the stage. They passed Firejewel and Etherjewel, heading the opposite direction; the dirty looks the twins gave them just made the trine laugh harder.

“We welcome Rodimus Prime of Iacon to the stage,” the announcer intoned, eliciting a roughly equal mixture of cheers and hisses from the spectators. “Prime, forgive me, but you’re listed as a solo dance.”

Comet answered before Rodimus could, his face blank and innocent as a wall. “We’re props.”

“I see.” The announcer waved them on; Rodimus nodded thanks. Up onto the stage they went, the trine via repulsors and Rodimus by climbing and a hand-up from Boomer.

“How’s _he_ going to dance?” The whisper hissed across the stage, so incautious it might as well have been shouted. “He can’t even repulsor-hop.”

“Is this some kind of joke?”

“Shut up, he can dance-”

“-discriminating against the flightless by letting him try-”

Rodimus couldn’t even parse the logic in that one. “O- _kay!”_ he shouted, lifting both hands and letting his voice carry. “Clearly a quick demo is in order before I start. Everyone okay with that?” There was a scattered roil of voices and a brief rain of applause. “Good. Guys, sorry, but could you hop off the stage again so there’s no confusion?”

The trine gracefully cleared the stage, but lingered at its edge as Rodimus peered up the near pole. It was higher than the ones in the dance tower, but he’d been warned about that. No big deal unless he lost his grip.

_Do not lose your grip, Hot Rod._

Rodimus shuttered his optics briefly, then took a leap and swarmed up the pole.

Mutters became exclamations as he climbed, hand over hand and thigh over knee, until the ceiling came close enough to touch. Rodimus christened it with a brush of fingers, then hooked his ankles together and fell back, dangling with an upside-down grin for the audience. “Convinced yet?” he called, turning his vision upside-down to better see their expressions.

_Yes!_ reached him in a delighted roar. Rodimus grinned and turned his vision right-side up, then himself right-side up and sliding down halfway. “Good. Then let’s not waste any more time. Boomer?”

Boomer laughed and waved acknowledgement, hopping back up onto the stage with her new trine. The three of them lay down on their backs around the two poles, equidistant from each other, and Boomer’s optics dimmed as she communicated with the hall’s music mixer. Redwing beamed at him, and Comet smiled, small and confident. Rodimus nodded to them and swung out into his starting pose, one hand and one knee clinging tightly to keep from rotating.

Vosian tech really didn’t know what to do with Earthen music, but Boomer’s preprogrammed settings made the human voice _ring_ in the wide space under the dome. Rodimus spread his arm, trailing it like a veil - Polaris entered his mind then, and he hid a smile - and leaned into a spin, blissfully surrendering to the music.

It started slow. The echoes of the singer’s voice built in layers like dancer’s silks and Rodimus bent and swayed with them, hand sliding down and then releasing, trusting his weight to his crossed legs, and reached out into nothingness. The beats counted down in his HUD, but he hardly needed the indicator to tell him when to pause, silence like a held vent - then it returned, Boomer and her trine extended their legs and engaged their antigravs and launched him up again with the first roll of drums.

He heard the crowd gasp as he flew, catching the pole overhead and swinging himself into a fast and graceful series of tricks - a spread-legged straddle around the pole transitioning to a straight-backed, one-leg-up pose with a fast backwards spin courtesy of Redwing’s antigrav-kick, then turning on his side to the upside-down one-armed, one-knee pose his first dance teacher had called the ‘hero.’ His outflung arm reached behind him and grasped the pole just above where the other hand was gripped and he turned again, spoiler to the pole, ankles crossed around it, until he let them go and braced his shoulder to the pole to ‘walk’ in the air until he was hanging almost perpendicular to the pole. He held the pose, arms and shoulder singing with the strain of it, until the singer’s cry of _sanctuary, my sanctuary_ was drowned out by the crowd’s awed cheer, then all together the trine pushed him back up again.

He was flying. His hips barely kissed the pole as he spun, his splayed, reaching pose light as silk, as graceful as Hot Rod had ever been. His body floated on the antigrav pillow his trine provided, head down, one arm and both legs extended, _perfect._ He bent his leg and spiraled on the pole, abandoned entirely to bliss and to beauty and the glory of what his body was capable of. Rodimus broke his perpendicular full split and turned again, snapping into a crouch with his hip and elbow trapping the pole as the music and the antigravs dropped at once. Rodimus fell, spark thrilling with the gasps of the crowd, and arrested his fall just before hitting the stage.

With the trine’s pedes firmly planted on the floor, this was the time for Roddy to show what a grounder could do. He put his pedes on the stage and almost bowed to the pole, both hands on it and back arched, swaying slightly as he slid down into a back curl stretch. Someone whistled; he grinned at the ceiling overhead, spread his legs into a full split and then kicked up into a headstand with one leg coyly bent. The position let him see into the optics of a couple of spectators close to the stage, just past Comet’s leg - they were riveted, staring like they wanted to climb up there with him. Clearly he was _tarting it up_ something fierce.

The music swelled back into being as they crossed the bridge. Rodimus disengaged in a quick cartwheel and remounted, a twisted grip pulling him upside down in a dead lift until he could hook one ankle around the pole and dangle in an inverted corkscrew. His arms spread, embracing the crowd as they spun by. _Nothing is whole,_ the singer exulted as Rodimus went up the pole again, _and nothing is broken._

The swell of the chorus was accompanied by a gravity-defying updraft, catching Rodimus under the spoiler and lifting him with enough force to let him leap the two-body-length distance to the second pole. The crowd went crazy as Rodimus caught the pole and swung around like a particularly sexy robot Tarzan, pedes flying, grinning wildly. Calculations streamed through his processor like ribbons as he spun, counting down the astroseconds until he drew his legs in, braced against the pole and leaped a second time. The trine caught him perfectly, which made it all the more a shock when the slickness of the pole betrayed him and he nearly missed his grip.

_Clang,_ the pole rang under his hands, between his thighs, his smile a grimace as he fought to regain his balance. The straight, shiny pole bucked like a sea monster in his grip. _//Status!//_ Boomer pinged, markers for panic wreathing the central glyph.

Instinct made him ping back _//status green,//_ but he followed it with instruction. _//Adjustments to the program incoming.//_ Mid-transition he pinged them a data packet, and all three sent him messages of acknowledgement and support. Rodimus leaned into his spin, side-on to the stage, and flung out his arm to the crowd’s acclaim. One more big jump now: Rodimus drew his knees in and prayed his last-minute adjustments were enough.

_What’s left of me… now._ Rodimus made the leap in near-silence, soaring on his borrowed antigrav field.

The pole took his weight without a hint of vibration. Rodimus locked one knee around it and leaned back in a graceful, triumphant rainbow arch, throwing all his class-six weight into his spin. The spectators whooped and applauded, drowning out the music until it crested again. Rodimus grinned wildly and pumped a fist, which wasn’t quite an approved dance move, but the cheers of his fans and the laughter of Boomer’s new trine were ringing in his audial receptors and he couldn’t have been flying any higher if he’d had wings of his own.

The trine swarmed him with hugs as soon as he touched the ground again. Laughing, Rodimus clung to them, pressing his helm to theirs’. “We did it,” he chanted breathlessly, “we did it, we did it, you were amazing, thank you-”

_“You_ were amazing!” Redwing insisted, gripping Rodimus’s arm in both hands and practically bouncing. “If I hadn’t been right under you I wouldn’t have believed it, you were _flying!”_

“Couldn’t have flown without you,” Rodimus assured hir, and Redwing laughed again and clung to him and hir trinemates all at once.

Eight legs, six wings and a spoiler all got in each other’s way as they shuffled off the stage to let the announcer make his closing remarks. None of them heard a word of it in any case, too swept away by the post-performance rush to do much more than grin at each other as Skyquake and Darkwing gently herded them into the back room and plied them with gelled energon and cooling blankets.

Rodimus did, however, notice the silent knowing looks they gave each other, and the hand Skyquake rested briefly on Darkwing’s shoulder. 

_They’ll be okay,_ he thought, and smiled, and shuttered his optics.

***

Starscream showed up while Rodimus was still glued to the broadcast screen in his suite - an upgrade from his quarters in the dance tower, though he’d insisted on bringing the hammock with him. “Congratulations,” he purred. “It seems everything worked out favorably for you after all.”

“I’m not celebrating until all the votes are counted,” Rodimus replied, though really Sterling was winning by a respectable margin. “It’s just asking to have the wind die under you.”

Starscream laughed. “Flier idiom? Vos truly has infected you.” Rodimus made a face at him and the ghost laughed again, only faintly derisive. “Come now, your predecessor couldn’t have done better. Your enemy is brought to justice! Freedom is restored! Vos and Iacon are allies for the first time in living memory! And may I say, that was an impressive dance, Prime. Technically cheating, but you seem to have gotten away with it on charisma alone.”

“You were watching?” Rodimus lifted an opticridge.

“It was being broadcast into the facility where Snowstorm’s being held.” Starscream chuckled. “He was mad enough to spit rivets but he couldn’t look away, poor thing.”

“I’ll bet.” Rodimus looked back at the screen. Sterling’s lead had increased another handful of percentage points, edging her over fifty percent. “So he’s, you know, okay after Virtuoso?”

“ _Primes_ and their soft sparks,” Starscream muttered despairingly. “He’s recovering. I doubt he’ll ever be quite the same again, but he can speak and fly and all, which frankly means he got off lightly. Even when it was sane, Virtuoso wasn’t kind to interlopers.”

Rodimus hummed acknowledgement, resting his chin on his folded hands. “...how is Virtuoso?” he asked. “Is it salvageable?”

Starscream was silent for a long moment. Finally, grudgingly, he admitted, “No. It’s beyond even my skills.”

“I’m sorry,” Rodimus offered without looking at him.

“Hmn.” Starscream leaned over the seat at Rodimus’s shoulder, watching as the votes ticked up and up inorexably. “Well. Just one more tie to cut, in the end. I’ll be content to return to Iacon with you, Rodimus.”

_I’m sure the Vosians will be relieved to hear that,_ Rodimus thought dryly, but sharing _that_ thought out loud wouldn’t lead to any productive conversations.

***

Rodimus’s shuttle back to the Iacon Highway was seen off by a crowd of fans and well-wishers, delaying Rodimus’s departure by a solid hour as the Prime insisted on greeting every one of them before he left, trading handclasps and kind words and, in the young dancers’ cases, hugs and ironclad promises to come and visit. Finally, though, the shuttle was in the air, the Iaconian Prime watching out the back window for his last glimpses of New Vos while Starscream found new things to complain about. He was so focused on the city, his ghostly companion’s voice just so much background noise, that he never noticed the shadow crossing his path from high above.

Cloudstreaker, exiled from his trine and his city, circled the Prime’s shuttle and then turned his thruster, flying away from Vos and Iacon alike.


	8. Chapter 8

“Roddy - hey, eight-bit!”

Rodimus Prime, about to step through the gate of his home city, paused and looked up. “Jazz!” he beamed brightly. “When’d you get back?”

Jazz, perched on the gatehouse tower, grinned and waved. “Last on-cycle. I hear you were on a vacation of your own.”

Rodimus shrugged, shifting his burden onto his other shoulder. “It turned out to be a working vacation.”

“Yeah, I know the feeling.” Jazz tilted his head. “Where’d you get the pole?”

“What, this?” Rodimus glanced casually at the pole slung over his shoulder. “Pulled it out of Magnus’s aft.”

Jazz laughed so hard he nearly fell off his perch. Rodimus grinned and sauntered smugly through the gate.

“How long were you waiting to use _that_ line?” Starscream, staying sensibly invisible in a street thronging with Autobots and their supporters, sounded as amused as Jazz had been.

“These things just come to me, I don’t plan them,” Rodimus answered airily. “Flying by my skidplate, that’s me. I lead a charmed existence.”

“Hmph.” A cold, tingly nudge. “You’re an odd mechanism, even for a Prime.”

Then Starscream’s presence was gone, leaving Rodimus to wonder if that was as close as Starscream ever came to a declaration of friendship.

***

The news that the Prime had returned spread like lightning through Iacon. By the time Rodimus had reached the central business district, his inbox was flooded with welcome-homes, reports, updates, and invitations. Also a suspicious absence of messages from his second-in-command, and Rodimus made a mental note to buy Arcee a goodie basket for apparently doing the impossible. He paused for a goodie break and to deal with his inbox a bit, sorting them according to priority and promising everyone a more thorough reply later. Around him, Iacon bustled, workers traveling back and forth and rubbing shoulders with salesmechs and performers and sightseers. Here, too, there was music, and creativity, and joy.

Rodimus stood again, pole resting against his shoulder. The work of a Prime was waiting for him, but he had one last dance-related task to perform first.

***

Sirius and Celesti were absent from Sunset House when Rodimus showed up. There to greet him were La Lune himself, Polaris - who welcomed him with a shriek of delight and a tackle - and the mysterious fourth star, Centauri, whom Rodimus hadn’t had a chance to meet.

“Pol didn’t tell me you were hot,” the tall, lean red shuttle commented with a grin, leaning back to get a good long look at the Prime. “Hey there, tall drink of oil.”

Rodimus tried not to sputter like a freshpaint, and mostly succeeded. Vos had been excellent training for Centauri. “Hey there yourself,” he grinned. “Lesti mentioned you. Nice to put a face to the name.”

“Yeah? I’d be happy to quell any scurrilous rumors.” Centauri tilted a saucy hip, five-pointed star badge clearly displayed. “Or start some.”

“Centauri, please.” La Lune stirred from his shadowed watch near the wall: the broad-winged shuttle frame gave him a strange otherworldly aspect, like a legendary spirit of mythology emerging from the Underdark. “Prime, you are welcome here, but I admit to some wariness regarding that.” He nodded to the pole, still wrapped in its protective corrugated packing material, that Rodimus had leaned against the wall in the foyer.

“There’s no better facility to mount it,” Rodimus explained, “not in Iacon. It’s specifically designed to be adaptable to a variety of mountings - just give it a look? Please?”

“I have to admit I’m really curious,” Polaris grinned, clinging to Rodimus’s hand.

“Me too.” The flicker of Centauri’s optics made it clear the focus of his curiosity was Rodimus, not the pole. “Why don’t we at least take a peek? We’re always looking for new acts, right?”

Lune glanced from Centauri to Polaris, their near-identical hopeful looks, then searchingly to the sky - with Sirius and Celesti elsewhere, he had no backup from Team Sensible, it seemed. “Very well. Bring it to the stage.”

Polaris yelped with glee as Rodimus bent to shoulder the pole again.

The stage was much as Rodimus had seen it last, with the addition of wire-frame ‘flowers’ hung in a garland around it: “You missed the tiki party,” Centauri explained with a wink, and Rodimus snapped his fingers in disappointment. Steading the pole on the stage with one hand and a knee, he cut the security wire near the top and slowly divested the pole of its wrapper.

“Oh-” Polaris pressed his hands to his mouth. “Look at it, it’s beautiful.”

Rodimus grinned, shamelessly proud: the pole Skyquake had given him _was_ a thing of beauty. The surface had been painted a deep bronze and coated with a polymer that gave it a faint velvety texture, lending just enough grip to the metal of Rodimus’s body that he would have no trouble staying on it. After nearly twenty cycles dancing on slippery Vosian poles, Rodimus knew he’d never take that texture for granted again.

While he and Polaris admired the pole’s surface, Lune’s analysis was all for the accompanying mounting apparatus. “I see,” he murmured as Rodimus glanced up. “Yes, I think we can adapt this with little difficulty.”

Polaris lit up. “You mean you’ll let him install it?”

“It will not be a permanent installation,” Lune warned, but Polaris was already leaping to hug him silly, and Lune’s arms automatically curved around him. “...very well,” he murmured, and the first smile Rodimus had ever seen from him touched Lune’s mouth.

“Thank you,” Rodimus said, moved. “I promise, I’ll make it worth your while.”

“You don’t mind dancing for a paying audience?” Lune glanced up him, lavender optics cool. “It seems contrary to the dignity of your office.”

To his own chagrin and Lune’s obvious shock, Rodimus started laughing. “Trust me,” he assured the proprietor, “I have never been attached to my dignity.”

“Lucky for us,” Centauri opined. “Seriously, this is so shiny. I can’t wait to see what you can do.”

***

Rodimus Prime’s Comeback Tour (limited engagement) was only advertised for eight cycles, but that was enough to bring Sunset House past the point of Standing Room Only and have eager guests spilling out into the front lot. Some bright spark got the idea of setting screens up outside to bring the dance to them, and someone else started selling goodies, and a miniature festival popped up among those waiting to see Rodimus Prime’s dance.

“This is kind of overwhelming,” Polaris admitted in a low voice, keeping Rodimus company in the green room while Sirius clucked over the state of his paint and polish.

Rodimus gave him a sheepish look. “I wasn’t expecting such a huge turnout. Who knew we had so many art lovers in this city?”

Sirius and Polaris exchanged a distinctly ‘sure, it’s the _art_ they came to see’ sort of look, which Rodimus pretended not to notice. “Are you nervous?” Sirius asked, buffing Rodimus’s hands carefully.

“Slag, yes,” Rodimus replied without a trace of shame. “The expo audience wasn’t half the size of this one. But I’m ready to go.”

Sirius smiled, patted his shoulder as Polaris hugged him around the waist. “You’ll do great, Rodimus. Just get out there and have some fun.”

“Thanks.” Rodimus leaned briefly into Sirius’s warmth and solidity, Polaris cuddled up in his arms. “Both of you. For being here with me, I mean. It helps.”

“Aw, sweetspark.” Polaris hugged him again, tight as a little boat ever could. “We’re so happy you chose us to share your talent with! I’ll be cheering you on, we all will.”

“Thanks,” Rodimus answered, returning the hug, and added, “Thinking of you helped steady my nerves before the expo dance in Vos.”

He’d just thought it would please Polaris to know, and he wasn’t wrong: Polaris squeaked, covered his mouth with his hands, and squeaked again, optics glimmering with emotion. Rodimus laughed as Polaris flung his arms around him one more time.

“You are _such a sweetspark,”_ Polaris proclaimed, his voice slightly muffled by Rodimus’s chestplate. _“Such_ a sweetspark.”

“I just tell the truth,” Rodimus protested modestly, patting Polaris’s helm. He blinked and glanced up at nothing when a ping entered his comm system. “Oops, that’s Lesti. Better get in place.”

Polaris obligingly hopped off his lap, and he and Sirius helped Rodimus to his pedes. “Good luck, Prime,” Sirius said cheerily, taking Polaris’s hand. “Not that you need it.”

“I’ll take all I can get,” Rodimus grinned, and headed up to his place backstage, rereading the good-luck messages in his inbox as he went: from Magnus, Arcee, Kup, Springer. Jazz, his missive full of cheeky emoticons. The builders he’d met on countless reconstructions projects. The proprietor of his favorite goodie stall.

Darkwing. Boomer. Redwing. Comet. Skyquake.

 _I am truly blessed in my comrades,_ Optimus Prime had been fond of saying. Rodimus Prime’s thoughts ran closer to _I am seriously the luckiest box of scrap metal alive._

 _“All right, darlings,”_ Celesti’s voice floated back to him. _“I think you’ve all been patient long enough, don’t you? Let’s show you what you all came to see.”_

 _//Ready,//_ Rodimus sent as the crowd outside roared its anticipation. _//How’s the live feed to Vos?//_

 _//By the grace of Primus and good engineering, we have a strong signal,//_ Celesti answered, a laugh in his comm-voice. _//Now get your spoiler out here.//_

 _//Yes sir.//_ Grinning, Rodimus cast aside the curtain and emerged into the spotlight on stage.

“Well, hello Iacon! Fancy meeting you here.”

Rodimus grinned wildly and spread his arms, basking in the enthusiasm of his audience. Over their heads, a single screen glowed; Rodimus waved at it. “And hey, Vos is here too! What do you think of Sunset House, your Excellency? Pretty cool, huh?”

Sterling, the red stripes of office freshly painted on her wings, smirked. “Despite their disreputable choice of entertainment, it’s an impressive venue. Vos salutes you, Sunset House.”

“Hi Roddy!” piped a familiar voice from behind her, all but drowned out by the approving cheers of the House’s crowd. Rodimus laughed and waved again as Redwing peeked under Sterling’s wing and grinned.

Celesti gave him a pointed look from stage left, though it was softened with a smile. “Yes, dear, you’re very pretty,” he drawled. “But I think these fine people were expecting something more?”

“Oh, right.” Rodimus grinned cheekily. “So, you all wanna see me dance?”

The crowd nearly deafened him with their approval. Laughing, Rodimus cued up the music and spun in place, letting the music move him in a prancing gait to the pole, guide his hips to rock against it. The polymer coating gripped at his hands, inviting him to climb, and as the singer proclaimed herself a _fine-tuned supersonic speed machine,_ Rodimus turned to face the audience, set his shoulder to the pole, and hauled himself up. His knees locked around the pole and he arched his back to face the audience again, seeing their expressions of breathless awe and delight. _He_ was doing that - not the Matrix, not the legacy of the Primes, just him and the pole and the music thumping through him.

He’d never have Hot Rod’s feather-light grace again, but Hot Rod could have only _dreamed_ of an audience like this.

He threw himself into his dance, the fast spins and the music and the roaring of appreciative engines merging into one bright, joyous whole.

 

**** _Several months later_ ***

 

The battlefield was veiled in blue-gray smoke so thick that Rodimus couldn’t locate the rest of his Autobots without thermal imaging, but one thing was clear: he’d been outmaneuvered. His backup had been herded into a ravine some distance away, and Rodimus himself was surrounded by the cooler, sharper heat-signatures of Scourge’s huntsmen. He was as trapped as his people.

“All right, fine,” he growled. “Bring it on!”

He lifted his rifle to his shoulder; someone gripped it from behind, and after a brief wrestling match succeeded in getting it away from him. “Cyclonus,” he spat, grabbing for it again as the spacejet lifted himself out of Rodimus’s reach.

“My orders are to capture you alive, but minor injuries are acceptable,” Cyclonus warned.

“Alive.” Rodimus grimaced, well aware of Scourge’s brood of clones - with Scourge himself among them, but slagged if Rodimus could tell which one was which without hearing them speak - closing in around him. “Why?”

A wry smirk showed itself on Cyclonus’s face. “Lord Galvatron requests a performance from Iacon’s premier pole artist.”

“How the frag did he-” Rodimus clamped down on his voice before it could hit an indignant shriek - he was spending way too much time with Starscream. “Never mind. If Galvatron wants to see me dance, he can buy a slagging ticket like everybody else, and you tell him that _verbatim-”_ Cyclonus’s optics flicked away from him, toward where the Autobots were still pinned down, and Rodimus understood without the Decepticon having to say a word. “You slagger,” he growled, and held his arms out.

“Galvatron guarantees your safety, and your return after your performance,” Cyclonus said, as the Sweeps quickly gripped the Prime’s arms as if afraid he was only pretending to surrender.

“Yeah, yeah. If my people aren’t left in one piece, I will give the worst performance of my career.” Rodimus winced as his pedes left the ground, borne aloft by the enemy with Cyclonus flying ahead. Below he could see his Autobots and Cyclonus’s Decepticons alike pause, blue and red optics shining up at him through the haze. Rodimus squirmed with embarrassment.

 _//Autobots, your Prime is not a prisoner but an honored guest of Galvatron,//_ Cyclonus broadcasted on a wide frequency range, patching Rodimus in to be polite. _//Refrain from further resistance, and he will not be harmed.//_

 _//It’s okay, guys,//_ Rodimus added, when Cyclonus’s words - shockingly - proved less than reassuring and the Autobots’ guns didn’t lower. _//Galvatron’s becoming a patron of the arts. Uh, kind of.//_

 _//The Decepticons launched an attack on our outpost because Galvatron wanted to watch you dance?//_ Arcee’s outrage lanced across the open link, making even Cyclonus wince. _//Why doesn’t he just buy a ticket?//_

 _//That’s what I said!//_

Truthfully, Rodimus thought Galvatron was most interested in the implications of a _private_ performace. It would be just like him. Rodimus could picture it all too easily: having the Prime dance at his command, watching him expertly mingle the athletic and the erotic the way he’d become known for, all while the powerful Unicronian engine was revving higher in thwarted need-

One of the Sweeps holding him coughed, and Rodimus realized his own engine was running a little too loud for dignity. “Might be easier if you’d watch those sharp points,” he said, and his captor obligingly shifted his grip.

 _What the hell,_ he thought, directing his gaze to the stars as they lifted into the sky. _If Galvatron wants to see me dance, I’ll give him a dance he’ll never forget._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, what an incredible ride. I've attempted long-form fics before, but this is the first one I've ever completed. To everyone who left kudos and comments - thank you all so, so much for coming along with with me on this journey. I couldn't have gotten to the finish line without you.
> 
> This is also the first fic I've written that has a playlist! I mean, it can't not, given the subject matter. XD The playlist link is [here on YouTube,](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLGMXHqlxN1NPY6GOq_Dgr8koItt3F4ZnF) and the list is as follows:
> 
> Ch1 Hot Rod dance - Dare, TF:TM soundtrack (natch)  
> Ch1 light pole dance - DEPARTURES, Globe  
> Ch1 Polaris’s dance - Open Your Heart To Me, Madonna  
> Ch2 first Vos dance - Starships, Nicki Minaj (Pentatonix cover)  
> Ch2 floor routine - Glory and Gore, Lorde  
> Ch3 practice - Can’t Get Enough, Suede  
> Ch4 Roddy’s crushes - Shake It Like an Earthquake, Family Force 5  
> Ch5 climb to the Command Tower - No Light No Light, Florence + the Machine  
> Ch6 platform fight - motor crazycycle, tefnek (FFVII: Voices of the Lifestream OCRemix)  
> Ch7 expo dance - Sanctuary, Utada Hikaru (Kingdom Hearts II opening)  
> Ch8 Sunset House dance - Shut Up and Drive, Rihanna  
> Bonus track: dancing for Galvatron - Warriors, Imagine Dragons
> 
> Thanks for listening, thanks for reading, and stay tuned - I'm not even close to done writing cool things yet. >D


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